Overweight and obesity associated with increased total serum calcium level: comparison of cross-sectional data in the health screening for teaching faculty.

Obesity is a risk of cardiovascular diseases. Our previous studies revealed that serum calcium level may have influence in the blood pressure to older male subjects. The aim of this study was to evaluate the relationship between total serum calcium level and overweight and obesity subjects. In our study, overweight and obesity status and total serum calcium level were measured among 2,503 subjects, at age range of 22-94 years, who were recruited for the routine health screening in 2006. The estimated mean for age (p < 0.001), white blood cell count (p = 0.037), hemoglobin concentration (p < 0.001), red blood cell count (p < 0.001), total serum calcium level (p < 0.001), total cholesterol weight (p < 0.001), HDL-cholesterol (p < 0.001), LDL-cholesterol (p < 0.001), and triglyceride (p < 0.001) of overweight and obesity subjects were significantly higher than those of non-overweight subjects. The prevalence of overweight/obesity in subjects according to the log-transformed total serum calcium level quartiles was 16.3-30.5 %. The prevalence of overweight/obesity subjects showed trends that were significant according to the total serum calcium level quartiles (p < 0.001). The odds ratios (ORs) and 95 % confidence intervals (CIs) for overweight/obesity of the second, third, and fourth quartiles compared to the lowest quartile were 1.407 (1.050-1.883), 1.543 (1.136-2.095), and 1.360 (0.995-1.859), respectively, after adjusting for sex and age (p < 0.001). These findings suggest that a higher prevalence of adult overweight/obesity is weakly associated with higher total serum calcium level in the Chinese population.

[Primary establishment of an alphaLISA assay for detection of HAV IgM].

OBJECTIVE: To develop an AlphaLISA method for detection of antibody of Hepatitis A virus. METHODS: After hepatitis A virus antigen was concentrated and biotinylated, optimal biotinylated HAV antigen, donor bead, acceptor bead concentration have been explored and determined by both dot-blotting and AlphaLISA methods. 97 samples including 23 serums from patients HAV infected and 70 serums from blood donors have been detected by new AlphaLISA method. RESULTS: The sensitivity and specificity for anti-HAV IgM were 78% and 98.5%, the positive and negative predictive value were 95% and 93%. CONCLUSION: A homogeneous and fast AlphaLISA assay for detection of HAV IgM has been established by preliminary verification on samples.

Heat shock protein 104 inhibited the fibrillization of prion peptide 106-126 and disassembled prion peptide 106-126 fibrils in vitro.

Amyloid-like fibrils have been associated with the pathogenesis of human prion diseases. Prion peptide of aa 106-126 (PrP106-126) exhibits many PrP(Sc)-like biochemical features, forming amyloid-like fibrils in vitro. Here, we found that the recombinant yeast-derived molecular chaperon Hsp104 inhibited significantly the fibril assembly of the synthetic PrP106-126 peptide by dynamic ThT assays in vitro. EM assays revealed almost no fibril-like structure after incubation of the synthetic PrP106-126 peptides with Hsp104 for 12h. Circular dichroism assays identified that treatment of Hsp104 shifted the secondary structure of PrP106-126 fibrils from ß-sheet to a random coil. MTT tests confirmed that interaction of PrP106-126 with Hsp104 maintained the toxicity of PrP106-126 on human neuroblastoma cell line SK-N-SH. Additionally, Hsp104 was able to disassemble the mature PrP106-126 fibrils in vitro, leading to recovering the cytotoxicity of PrP106-126 on SK-N-SH cells. Our study provides the molecular evidences that the yeast-derived Hsp104 can interfere in the fibril assembly and disassembly of human PrP106-126 segment.