A treatment approach of severe vulvar edema in ovarian hyperstimulation syndrome patient: A case report.

Background: Ovarian hyperstimulation syndrome (OHSS) is a serious life-threatening complication of infertility treatment. Vulvar edema is a disease with various causes and frequent phenomena seen in physiological and pathologic conditions like pregnancy, inflammatory disorders, tumors, idiopathic reasons, and most importantly, in the severe form of OHSS. Case Presentation: Here, we report a 26-yr-old woman with severe OHSS, recombinant follicle-stimulating hormone therapy. 8 days later, we observed a mild and asymmetrical swelling of the vulva with severe edema in the right labia. Due to the worsening of the vulvar edema even after 15 days of conservative treatment, hand massage and compressive bandaging of the vulva were performed, which caused rapid recovery within 20 min of the case. Conclusion: Treatment with a hand massage with lubricant gel followed by compressive bandaging resolved the vulvar edema immediately; it is an easy procedure without any adverse events.

Structural and kinetic insights into HIV-1 reverse transcriptase inhibition by farnesiferol C.

Human immunodeficiency virus type 1 reverse transcriptase (HIV-1 RT) is the key enzyme for the virus gene replication and the most important target for antiviral therapy. Toxicity, drug resistance and side effects have led to search for new antiviral agents. Farnesiferol C (FC) is a well-known biologically active sesquiterpene coumarin derivative from genus Ferula. The current study was designed to examine the impacts of FC on the structure and function of HIV-1 RT, using some theoretical and experimental methods. FC inhibited HIV-1RT activity via mixed inhibition mechanism (IC50 = 30 µM). Spectroscopic data showed some conformational changes in the secondary as well as tertiary structure of HIV-1RT following the interaction with FC. Results showed that FC could quench the intrinsic fluorescence emission of HIV-1RT through static quenching mechanism. Thermodynamic parameters revealed that hydrogen bondings and van der Waals forces are the major forces in the binding reaction and the low equilibrium constants (KD) value obtained from surface plasmon resonance data, confirmed the high affinity of FC for HIV-1RT. Molecular docking studies indicated that FC interacts with enzyme through hydrophobic pocket. Taken together, the outcomes of this research revealed that, sesquiterpene coumarines can be used to design natural remedies as anti-HIV agents.

Effects of Delphinidin on Pathophysiological Signs of Nucleus Basalis of Meynert Lesioned Rats as Animal Model of Alzheimer Disease.

Alzheimer's disease (AD) is an advanced neurodegenerative disorder greatly accompanied by cognitive deficits, oxidative stress, inflammation, amyloid plaques deposition, and acetylcholinesterase (AChE) hyper-activation. Growing evidence suggests natural compounds with antioxidant and anti-inflammatory features improve pathophysiological signs of AD. The present study was designed to investigate the effects of Delphinidin (25, 50 mg/kg) as an anthocyanidin on spatial memory impairment and AD hallmarks such as hippocampal AChE activity, amyloid plaques deposition, oxidative stress and expression of amyloid precursor protein (APP), AChE, and amyloid beta (Aß) proteins in nucleus basalis of Meynert (NBM) lesioned rats as the most prevalent animal model of AD. Interestingly, Delphinidin-treated animals showed a significant decrease in escape latency and distance moved. Furthermore, in probe test, NBM lesioned rats treated with both doses of Delphinidin spent more time in the target quadrant zone in Morris water maze task. It could also interact with catalytic site of AChE enzyme and inhibits acetylcholine hydrolysis in in vitro and in vivo conditions. In addition, Delphinidin could scavenge additional produced reactive oxygen molecules dose dependently. Our immunoblotting analysis confirmed high dose of Delphinidin reduced AChE, APP and Aß contents in AD model. Staining of hippocampus tissue revealed that Delphinidin treatment decreased amyloid plaques formation in NBM lesion rats. It seems that Delphinidin is a plate-like molecule intercalated between ß-plated sheets related to Aß molecules and inhibited amyloid fibril formation. Altogether, Delphinidin and Delphinidin-rich fruits could be suggested as a therapeutic adjuvant in AD and other related cognitive disorders.

Surface plasmon resonance, fluorescence, and molecular docking studies of bovine serum albumin interactions with natural coumarin diversin.

In the present study the binding of diversin (DIV), a prenylated coumarin isolated from Ferula diversivittata, to bovine serum albumin (BSA) was investigated using surface plasmon resonance (SPR), spectrofluorimetry, and molecular docking approaches. Following the activation of carboxylic groups, via NHS/EDC, BSA was immobilized on the carboxymethyl dextran (CMD) hydrogel coated Au sensor, and was used for real-time monitoring of the interactions between DIV and BSA. KD value of DIV binding to BSA increased with increasing temperature, confirmed that the affinity between BSA and DIV decreases with rising temperature. In addition, the fluorescence and synchronous fluorescence spectroscopic data revealed that the intrinsic emission intensity of BSA was quenched via a dynamic mechanism. In addition, the micro-region around BSA tyrosine residue was changed upon interaction with DIV. The thermodynamic parameter findings suggested that the hydrophobic interactions were dominant in the binding and formation of the BSA and DIV complex. The molecular docking outputs indicated that there is only one binding site on BSA for DIV, in agreement with experimental data, and DIV bind BSA in subdomain IB.

Improving effects of Echium amoenum aqueous extract on rat model of Alzheimer's disease.

Alzheimer's disease (AD) is a progressive neurodegenerative disorder greatly accompanied by oxidative stress and acetylcholine reduction in synaptic cleft that leads to dementia. Previously approved there is correlation between nucleus basalis of Meynert (NBM) degeneration and loss of memory, learning ability and thought. The aim of this study was to investigate improving effects of Echium amoenum aqueous extract on memory deficient, pathophysiological and oxidative damages imposed by NBM lesion in rats as documented AD model. Results showed NBM destruction causes hash oxidative stress that possibly leads to neurodegeneration in hippocampus tissue. Orally administration of plant extract significantly reduced oxidative stress by reactive molecules scavenging that resulted to decrease lipid peroxidation also. Plant extract treatment inhibited acetylcholine esterase enzyme (more than 5 folds) in hippocampus tissue related to NBM lesioned rats. Histological studies approved NBM lesion causes harsh neurodegeneration in hippocampus tissue possibly by acetylcholine reduction that was compensated by plant extract protective effects. Interestingly improving effects of plant in molecular level causes improved spatial learning ability in Morris water maze test. By considering pathophysiological and molecular similarities between AD and NBM lesion model, E. amoenum could be used as a therapeutic adjuvant in patients suffering from Alzheimer or similar cognitive disorders.

Chrysin as an Anti-Cancer Agent Exerts Selective Toxicity by Directly Inhibiting Mitochondrial Complex II and V in CLL B-lymphocytes.

We investigated the effect of chrysin on isolated normal and chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL) B-lymphocytes and their isolated mitochondria. We report that a selective and significant increase in cytotoxicity, intracellular reactive oxygen species, mitochondrial membrane potential collapse, ADP/ATP ratio, caspase 3 activation and finally apoptosis in chrysin-treated CLL B- lymphocytes. Also we determined that chrysin selectively inhibits complex II and ATPases in cancerous mitochondria. In this study we proved that the ability of chrysin to promote apoptosis in CLL B-lymphocytes performed by selectively targeting of mitochondria. Our findings may provide a potential therapeutic approach for using chrysin to target mitochondria in CLL B-lymphocytes.

Antioxidant effects of alfalfa can improve iron oxide nanoparticle damage: Invivo and invitro studies.

Medicago sativa Linn. or alfalfa (Leguminosae) has been used traditionally as an effective cure for CNS, heart and metabolic disorders and digestive aids. Alfalfa is a resistant plant against stress due to small antioxidant molecules and enzymes. Our previous work demonstrated that 100 µg/ml of 50 nm size Fe2O3-NP causes harsh oxidative stress in HepG2 cells and 100 mg/kg of same nanoparticle causes extreme damage in rat's liver. Therefore it can be used as a useful model for invivo and invitro studies of oxidative stress. This study assessed the effects of two concentration of alfalfa on the mentioned invivo and invitro damage. Our results showed alfalfa reduced reactive oxygen species (ROS) production and enhanced reduced glutathione (GSH) that cause reduction of DNA fragmentation and prevent apoptosis pathway so improve viability of the cells. Results also showed alfalfa decreased hepatic enzymes penetrating and lipid peroxidation in rat's liver. Note that Fe2O3-NP potentially has widespread biological application but its usage is limited due to bio incompatibility. A suitable antioxidant compound that reduce nanoparticle side effects can be used as an effective adjuvant with iron oxide nanoparticle (and may be other nanomaterials) in biological applications.