Active Components of Traditional Chinese Medicinal Material for Multiple Myeloma: Current Evidence and Future Directions.

Multiple myeloma (MM) is a hematological malignancy characterized by clonal expansion of plasma cells in bone marrow, leading to the overproduction of monoclonal immunoglobulins. The clinical manifestations resulting from monoclonal proteins and malignant cells include signs of end-organ damage, such as hypercalcemia, renal failure, anemia, and bone lesions. Despite improvement in the survival of MM patients with use of myeloma-targeted and immunomodulatory therapies, MM remains an incurable disease. Moreover, patients with relapsed or refractory MM show poor survival outcomes. In recent years, there has been a growing interest in the use of traditional Chinese medicinal materials (TCMMs) for management of a wide spectrum of diseases. The bioactive ingredients derived from TCMMs hold great potential for the development of anticancer drugs. Here we summarize the evidence of the pharmacological effects of the active components in TCMMs on MM, including curcumin, resveratrol, baicalein, berberine, bufalin, cinobufagin, gambogic acid, ginsenoside, icariin, daidzin, formononetin, polysaccharides extracts from Hedyotis difus, and scutellarein. Available evidence indicates that the anti-MM effects of these bioactive ingredients are mediated via regulation of proliferation, apoptosis, autophagy, cell cycle, osteogenic differentiation, and drug resistance. In the future, the underlying mechanisms of the anti-MM effects of these components should be further investigated. Large-scale and well-designed clinical trials are also required to validate the efficacy of these bioactive constituents for MM.

Screening and identification of endometrial proteins as novel potential biomarkers for repeated implantation failure.

Inadequate endometrial receptivity may be responsible for the low implantation rate of transferred embryos in in vitro fertilization (IVF) treatments. Patients with repeated implantation failure (RIF) impact the clinical pregnancy rate for IVF. We collected endometrial tissue during the implantation window of hysteroscopy biopsies from September 2016 to December 2019 and clinical data were collected simultaneously. Patients were divided into RIF and pregnant controls group according to pregnancy outcomes. A total of 82 differentially expressed endometrial proteins were identified, including 55 up-regulated proteins (>1.50-fold, P < 0.05) and 27 down-regulated proteins (<0.67-fold, P < 0.05) by iTRAQ labeling coupled with the 2D LC MS/MS technique in the RIF group. String analysis found interactions between these proteins which assembled in two bunches: ribosomal proteins and blood homeostasis proteins. The most significant enriched Gene Ontology terms were negative regulation of hydrolase activity, blood microparticle, and enzyme inhibitor activity. Our results emphasized the corticosteroid-binding globulin and fetuin-A as the specific proteins of endometrial receptivity by Western-blot. Our study provided experimental data to establish the objective indicator of endometrial receptivity, and also provided new insight into the pathogenesis of RIF.