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Background: The changes in the microenvironment of degenerative intervertebral discs cause oxidative stress injury and excessive apoptosis of intervertebral disc endogenous stem cells. The purpose of this study was to explore the possible mechanism of the protective effect of melatonin on oxidative stress injury in NPMSCs induced by H2O2. Methods: The Cell Counting Kit-8 assay was used to evaluate the cytotoxicity of hydrogen peroxide and the protective effects of melatonin. ROS content was detected by 2'7'-dichlorofluorescin diacetate (DCFH-DA). Mitochondrial membrane potential (MMP) was detected by the JC-1assay. Transferase mediated d-UTP Nick end labeling (TUNEL) and Annexin V/PI double staining were used to determine the apoptosis rate. Additionally, apoptosis-associated proteins and PI3K/Akt signaling pathway-related proteins were evaluated by immunofluorescence, immunoblotting and PCR. ECMs were evaluated by RTâPCR and immunofluorescence. In vivo, X-ray, Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) and Histological analyses were used to evaluate the protective effect of melatonin. Results: Melatonin had an obvious protective effect on NPMSCs treated with 0-10 µM melatonin for 24 h. In addition, melatonin also had obvious protective effects on mitochondrial dysfunction, decreased membrane potential and cell senescence induced by H2O2. More importantly, melatonin could significantly reduce the apoptosis of nucleus pulposus mesenchymal stem cells induced by H2O2 by regulating the expression of apoptosis-related proteins and decreasing the rate of apoptosis. After treatment with melatonin, the PI3K/Akt pathway was significantly activated in nucleus pulposus mesenchymal stem cells, while the protective effect was significantly weakened after PI3K-IN-1 treatment. In vivo, the results of X-ray, MRI and histological analyses showed that therapy with melatonin could partially reduce the degree of intervertebral disc degeneration. Conclusion: Our research demonstrated that melatonin can effectively alleviate the excessive apoptosis and mitochondrial dysfunction of nucleus pulposus mesenchymal stem cells induced by oxidative stress via the PI3K/Akt pathway, which provides a novel idea for the therapy of intervertebral disc degeneration. The translational potential of this article: This study indicates that melatonin can effectively alleviate the excessive apoptosis and mitochondrial dysfunction of NPMSCs through activating the PI3K/Akt pathway. Melatonin might serve as a promising candidate for the prevention and treatment of Intervertebral disc degeneration disease (IVDD) in the future.
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Clear cell renal cell carcinoma (ccRCC) is a major pathological type of kidney cancer with a poor prognosis due to a lack of biomarkers for early diagnosis and prognosis prediction of ccRCC. In this study, we investigated the aberrant expression of Acyl-coenzyme A oxidase 1 (ACOX1) in ccRCC and evaluated its potential in diagnosis and prognosis. ACOX1 is the first rate-limiting enzyme in the peroxidation ß-oxidation pathway and is involved in the regulation of fatty acid oxidative catabolism. The mRNA and protein levels of ACOX1 were significantly downregulated in ccRCC, and its downregulation was closely associated with the tumor-node-metastasis stage of patients. The ROC curves showed that ACOX1 possesses a high diagnostic value for ccRCC. The OS analysis suggested that lower expression of ACOX1 was closely related to the worse outcome of patients. In addition, gene set enrichment analysis suggested that expression of ACOX1 was positively correlated with CDH1, CDH2, CDKL2, and EPCAM, while negatively correlated with MMP9 and VIM, which strongly indicated that ACOX1 may inhibit the invasion and migration of ccRCC by reversing epithelial-mesenchymal transition. Furthermore, we screened out that miR-16-5p is upregulated at the mRNA transcript level in ccRCC and negatively correlated with ACOX1. In conclusion, our results showed that ACOX1 is abnormally low expressed in ccRCC, suggesting that it could serve as a diagnostic and prognostic biomarker for ccRCC. Overexpression of miR-16-5p may be responsible for the inactivation of ACOX1.
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A method was developed for the direct determination of 16 ultra-trace polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) in water by liquid chromatography (LC) coupled with online solid phase extraction (online SPE). The water sample was centrifuged at a high speed to remove the particulate matter and prepared into an aqueous solution containing 40% (v/v) methanol. A 2 mL-sample was directly injected into the online SPE flow path. Online purification and enrichment of the samples were carried out on the SPE column (Acclaim PA â ¡, 50 mm×4.6 mm, 3 µm). The PAHs eluted from the SPE column were transferred to the analytical flow path by valve switching, and were separated on a Hypersil Green PAHs column (150 mm×3 mm, 3 µm). Water and acetonitrile were used as the mobile phases. The flow rates of 1.0 mL/min and 0.4 mL/min were used in the extraction and balance processes, respectively. The flow rate of 0.6 mL/min was used to separate the PAHs in the analytical flow path. Acenaphthylene without a fluorescent signal was detected at the ultraviolet absorption wavelength of 220 nm, while other PAHs were measured by the fluorescence signal via the special excitation/emission wavelength program. The entire analysis could be completed within 37 min. The linear correlation coefficients of the 16 PAHs were greater than 0.996. The limits of detection of the PAHs were 0.14-12.50 ng/L (S/N=3) with only 0.38 ng/L for benzo(a)pyrene (B(a)P). The recoveries of PAHs at spiked levels of 10, 40 and 200 ng/L in the water samples were 76.1%-134.9%. The RSDs (n=3) were 0.3%-16.6%. Furthermore, the recoveries and RSDs (n=3) of B(a)P were 71.8%-92.7% and 3.9%, respectively. The proposed method is simple, rapid, solvent-saving, stable and sensitive, and can meet the ultra-trace analysis requirements of the PAHs (especially B(a)P) in various water samples.
