Nanotechnology as a therapeutic strategy to prevent neuropsychomotor alterations associated with hypercholesterolemia.

Hypercholesterolemia has been linked to neurodegenerative disease development. Previously others and we demonstrated that high levels of plasma cholesterol-induced memory impairments and depressive-like behavior in mice. More recently, some evidence reported that a hypercholesterolemic diet led to motor alterations in rodents. Peripheral inflammation, blood-brain barrier (BBB) dysfunction, and neuroinflammation seem to be the connective factors between hypercholesterolemia and brain disorders. Herein, we aimed to investigate whether treatment with gold nanoparticles (GNPs) can prevent the inflammation, BBB disruption, and behavioral changes related to neurodegenerative diseases and depression, induced by hypercholesterolemic diet intake in mice. Adult Swiss mice were fed a standard or a high cholesterol diet for eight weeks and concomitantly treated with either vehicle or GNPs by the oral route. At the end of treatments, mice were subjected to behavioral tests. After that, the blood, liver, and brain structures were collected for biochemical analysis. The high cholesterol diet-induced an increase in the plasma cholesterol levels and body weight of mice, which were not modified by GNPs treatment. Hypercholesterolemia was associated with enhanced liver tumor necrosis factor- α (TNF-α), BBB dysfunction in the hippocampus and olfactory bulb, memory impairment, cataleptic posture, and depressive-like behavior. Notably, GNPs administration attenuated liver inflammation, BBB dysfunction, and improved behavioral and memory deficits in hypercholesterolemic mice. Also, GNPs increased mitochondrial complex I activity in the prefrontal cortex of mice. It is worth highlight that GNPs' administration did not cause toxic effects in the liver and kidney of mice. Overall, our results indicated that GNPs treatment potentially mitigated peripheral, brain, and memory impairments related to hypercholesterolemia.

How has dental pulp stem cells isolation been conducted? A scoping review.

The objective of this study was to realize a scoping review the literature in order to identify the profile of DPSCs isolation and analyze the possible risk factors that could change the native behavior of these cells. An initial search was conducted using the following MeSH terms: "(dental pulp stem cell [MeSH])"; "(dental pulp [MeSH])" AND "(stem cell [MeSH])"; "("dental pulp stem cell" [MeSH]")". The electronic search was done without date restriction up to and including April 2014, in PubMed, Scopus, Scielo and ISI Web of Knowledge databases. Studies were submitted to inclusion and exclusion criteria and 222 articles were included. Data showed that over the past 15 years many studies have been conducted using DPSCs. However this is the first systematic review regarding the isolation of stem cell, and more specifically of dental pulp stem cells. The isolation of dental pulp stem cells showed great variability, hampering the development of standard protocols to achieve in vitro dental pulp stem cells with similar characteristics. This scoping review combined, for the first time, the methodologies used for dental pulp stem isolation, highlighting the most frequently used.