Is postpartum depression related to total weight gain during pregnancy and maternal anemia?

OBJECTIVE: This study aimed to investigate the effects of weight gain and maternal anemia on postpartum depression. METHODS: This is a prospective, single-center, case-control study. We recorded the demographic characteristics, blood ferritin level, and weight gain during the pregnancy. This study was planned between April 2023 and June 2023 in the Obstetrics and Gynecology Clinic of Ankara Etlik City Hospital. A total of 109 patients were enrolled in the study. Patients were assessed with the Edinburgh Postpartum Depression Scale. Weight gain, nutritional education, educational level, mode of delivery, and pregnancy history were asked in person. Ferritin levels at the onset of labor were determined to detect anemia. Twin births, births due to fetal anomalies or intrauterine stillbirths, patients with systemic infections, and patients diagnosed with a psychiatric disorder in the past 6 months whose records were not accessible were excluded from the study. RESULTS: Pregnancy weight gain and percentage of pregnancy weight gain were higher. Serum ferritin levels and nutritional education during pregnancy were lower in the postpartum depression group (p<0.001). These parameters with statistical significance were identified as risk factors in the regression analysis for postpartum depression (p<0.05). In receiver operating characteristics analysis, >15 kg for weight gain, >28.8 for percentage of weight gain in pregnancy, and <19 ng/dL for serum ferritin level were identified as cutoff values (p<0.001). CONCLUSION: Nutritional education and vitamin supplementation should be recommended to pregnant women during routine examinations.

Is postpartum depression related to total weight gain during pregnancy and maternal anemia?

SUMMARY OBJECTIVE: This study aimed to investigate the effects of weight gain and maternal anemia on postpartum depression. METHODS: This is a prospective, single-center, case-control study. We recorded the demographic characteristics, blood ferritin level, and weight gain during the pregnancy. This study was planned between April 2023 and June 2023 in the Obstetrics and Gynecology Clinic of Ankara Etlik City Hospital. A total of 109 patients were enrolled in the study. Patients were assessed with the Edinburgh Postpartum Depression Scale. Weight gain, nutritional education, educational level, mode of delivery, and pregnancy history were asked in person. Ferritin levels at the onset of labor were determined to detect anemia. Twin births, births due to fetal anomalies or intrauterine stillbirths, patients with systemic infections, and patients diagnosed with a psychiatric disorder in the past 6 months whose records were not accessible were excluded from the study. RESULTS: Pregnancy weight gain and percentage of pregnancy weight gain were higher. Serum ferritin levels and nutritional education during pregnancy were lower in the postpartum depression group (p<0.001). These parameters with statistical significance were identified as risk factors in the regression analysis for postpartum depression (p<0.05). In receiver operating characteristics analysis, >15 kg for weight gain, >28.8 for percentage of weight gain in pregnancy, and <19 ng/dL for serum ferritin level were identified as cutoff values (p<0.001). CONCLUSION: Nutritional education and vitamin supplementation should be recommended to pregnant women during routine examinations.

Human ACE2 orthologous peptide sequences show better binding affinity to SARS-CoV-2 RBD domain: Implications for drug design.

Computational methods coupled with experimental validation play a critical role in the identification of novel inhibitory peptides that interact with viral antigenic determinants. The interaction between the receptor binding domain (RBD) of SARS-CoV-2 spike protein and the helical peptide of human angiotensin-converting enzyme-2 (ACE2) is a necessity for the initiation of viral infection. Herein, natural orthologs of human ACE2 helical peptide were evaluated for competitive inhibitory binding to the viral RBD by use of a computational approach, which was experimentally validated. A total of 624 natural ACE2 orthologous 32-amino acid long peptides were identified through a similarity search. Molecular docking was used to virtually screen and rank the peptides based on binding affinity metrics, benchmarked against human ACE2 peptide docked to the RBD. Molecular dynamics (MD) simulations were done for the human reference and the Nipponia nippon peptide as it exhibited the highest binding affinity (Gibbs free energy; -14 kcal/mol) predicted from the docking results. The MD simulation confirmed the stability of the assessed peptide in the complex (-12.3 kcal/mol). The top three docked-peptides (from Chitinophaga sancti, Nipponia nippon, and Mus musculus) and the human reference were experimentally validated by use of surface plasmon resonance technology. The human reference exhibited the weakest binding affinity (Kd of 318-441 pM) among the peptides tested, in agreement with the docking prediction, while the peptide from Nipponia nippon was the best, with 267-538-fold higher affinity than the reference. The validated peptides merit further investigation. This work showcases that the approach herein can aid in the identification of inhibitory biosimilar peptides for other viruses.

Large-Scale Production of Anti-RNase A VHH Expressed in pyrG Auxotrophic Aspergillus oryzae.

Nanobodies, also referred to as VHH antibodies, are the smallest fragments of naturally produced camelid antibodies and are ideal affinity reagents due to their remarkable properties. They are considered an alternative to monoclonal antibodies (mAbs) with potential utility in imaging, diagnostic, and other biotechnological applications given the difficulties associated with mAb expression. Aspergillus oryzae (A. oryzae) is a potential system for the large-scale expression and production of functional VHH antibodies that can be used to meet the demand for affinity reagents. In this study, anti-RNase A VHH was expressed under the control of the glucoamylase promoter in pyrG auxotrophic A. oryzae grown in a fermenter. The feature of pyrG auxotrophy, selected for the construction of a stable and efficient platform, was established using homologous recombination. Pull-down assay, size exclusion chromatography, and surface plasmon resonance were used to confirm the binding specificity of anti-RNase A VHH to RNase A. The affinity of anti-RNase A VHH was nearly 18.3-fold higher (1.9 nM) when expressed in pyrG auxotrophic A. oryzae rather than in Escherichia coli. This demonstrates that pyrG auxotrophic A. oryzae is a practical, industrially scalable, and promising biotechnological platform for the large-scale production of functional VHH antibodies with high binding activity.

Expression and characterization of recombinant IL-1Ra in Aspergillus oryzae as a system.

BACKGROUND: The interleukin-1 receptor antagonist (IL-1Ra) is a crucial molecule that counteracts the effects of interleukin-1 (IL-1) by binding to its receptor. A high concentration of IL-1Ra is required for complete inhibition of IL-1 activity. However, the currently available Escherichia coli-expressed IL-1Ra (E. coli IL-1Ra, Anakinra) has a limited half-life. This study aims to produce a cost-effective, functional IL-1Ra on an industrial scale by expressing it in the pyrG auxotroph Aspergillus oryzae. RESULTS: We purified A. oryzae-expressed IL-1Ra (Asp. IL-1Ra) using ion exchange and size exclusion chromatography (53 mg/L). Sodium dodecyl sulfate-polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis (SDS-PAGE) analysis revealed that Asp. IL-1Ra is N-glycosylated and approximately 17 kDa in size. We conducted a comparative study of the bioactivity, binding kinetics, and half-life between Asp. IL-1Ra and E. coli IL-1Ra. Asp. IL-1Ra showed good bioactivity even at a low concentration of 0.5 nM. The in vitro half-life of Asp. IL-1Ra was determined for different time points (0, 24, 48, 72, and 96 h) and showed higher stability than E. coli IL-1Ra, despite exhibiting a 100-fold lower binding affinity (2 nM). CONCLUSION: This study reports the production of a functional Asp. IL-1Ra with advantageous stability, without extensive downstream processing. To our knowledge, this is the first report of a recombinant functional and stable IL-1Ra expressed in A. oryzae. Our results suggest that Asp. IL-1Ra has potential for industrial-scale production as a cost-effective alternative to E. coli IL-1Ra.

Functional crackers: incorporation of the dietary fibers extracted from citrus seeds.

Dietary fibers extracted from defatted press meals of orange and grapefruit seeds were used in the production of crackers and the crackers were evaluated for physicochemical, textural, sensory properties, and bioactive compounds. The unexplored fibers (grapes seeds and orange seeds) and wheat fiber were added at 2.9% levels. The effects of incorporation of different fibers on composition and consumer acceptability were evaluated. The textural stability during storage was also monitored. Although there were no significant differences for proximate compositions; fiber contents, antioxidant capacities, and phenolics compositions were significantly higher in the crackers containing orange seeds fiber. Sensory analysis showed that taste/flavor attribute scores were low, while appearance scores were equal to the control sample. The fracturability, hardness and water activity values remain constant up to 90 days storage at room temperature. The crackers containing orange seed and grapes seed fiber could provide some health benefits to consumers due to their high fiber and flavonoid contents.

Combination of conventional chemotherapeutics with redox-active cerium oxide nanoparticles--a novel aspect in cancer therapy.

Nanotechnology is becoming an important field of biomedical and clinical research and the application of nanoparticles in disease may offer promising advances in treatment of many diseases, especially cancer. Malignant melanoma is one of the most aggressive forms of cancer and its incidence is rapidly increasing. Redox-active cerium oxide nanoparticles (CNP) are known to exhibit significant antitumor activity in cells derived from human skin tumors in vitro and in vivo, whereas CNP is nontoxic and beyond that even protective (antioxidative) in normal, healthy cells of the skin. As the application of conventional chemotherapeutics is associated with harmful side effects on healthy cells and tissues, the clinical use is restricted. In this study, we addressed the question of whether CNP supplement a classical chemotherapy, thereby enhancing its efficiency without additional damage to normal cells. The anthracycline doxorubicin, one of the most effective cancer drugs, was chosen as reference for a classical chemotherapeutic agent in this study. Herein, we show that CNP enhance the antitumor activity of doxorubicin in human melanoma cells. Synergistic effects on cytotoxicity, reactive oxygen species generation, and oxidative damage in tumor cells were observed after co-incubation. In contrast to doxorubicin, CNP do not cause DNA damage and even protect human dermal fibroblasts from doxorubicin-induced cytotoxicity. A combination of classical chemotherapeutics with nongenotoxic but antitumor active CNP may provide a new strategy against cancer by improving therapeutic outcome and benefit for patients.

Developmental competence of domestic cat oocytes from ovaries stored at various durations at 4 degrees C temperature.

Temporal storage of ovaries can provide opportunity to rescue oocytes from ovaries of endangered felids. The objective of the study was to examine the effect of different storage periods (2, 24 and 48h) of ovaries at 4 degrees C for maturation of cat oocytes in vitro. Ovaries were collected from 25 domestic cats at various stages of the estrous cycle by routine ovariohysterectomy following anesthesia at different local veterinary clinics, and maintained in physiological saline at 4 degrees C for 2, 24 or 48h until oocytes recovery. Selected COCs were maturated at 38 degrees C for 48h in four-well petri dishes, which included 500microL modified synthetic oviduct fluid (mSOF) medium under mineral oil in a humidified 5% CO(2), 5% O(2), and 90% N(2) atmosphere incubator. After the in vitro maturation period, there were no differences between the rate of oocytes matured at MII stages in 2 and 24h storage groups (50.7% and 48.2% respectively, p>0.05). However, the same result for the 48h group was significantly lower than the 2 and 24h groups (28.0%, p<0.001). Our results suggest that while 2 or 24h storage of ovaries at 4 degrees C does not affect the meiotic competence of oocytes in vitro, 48h storage of ovaries decrease the results dramatically.