Background: Khat chewing is a long standing social-cultural habit in several countries. Even though many people chew khat simply for its pleasurable and stimulatory effect, evidence showed widely-held belief among khat chewers in Ethiopia and other part of the world that khat helps to lower blood glucose while some studies are contradicted on the effect of khat. There is limited data about khat’s effect on blood glucose especially in our setting, Harar estern Ethiopia. Objective: Primarily the present study aims to compare fasting blood sugar level among khat chewer diabetic and healthy individuals, and to asses risk factors associated with poor glycemic control in diabetic subjects. Method: A cross-sectional study included 200 confirmed diabetic and healthy subjects. Fasting blood sugar was determined by enzymatic method glucose oxidase and glucose hexokinase. Glycemic control was also determined for diabetic subjects based on the last 2-month diabetic clinic visits and current measurement. Result: (Median ± IQR [interquartile range]) fasting blood sugar difference among Khat chewer and non khat chewer were 159 ± 83 mg/dl and 202 ± 79 mg/dl respectively in diabetic subjects when tested by glucose oxidase. Similarly, in healthy non khat chewer and khat chewer, khat chewers has lower (Median ± IQR) fasting blood glucose level 82 ± 18 mg/dl than non khat chewers 94 ± 13 mg/dl when tested by glucose oxidase. Regarding risk factors associated with poor glycemic control in diabetic subjects, positive parental diabetes history, insulin medication, being overweight, obese were significantly associated with poor glycemic control. Conclusion: There was significant effect of khat on median FBS among khat chewers in diabetic and healthy individuals. And the proportion of glycemic control was high among diabetic subjects. Recommendation: Health care professional and patients should manage the risk factors to delay disease progression and restrain the damage. More studies should be conducted in randomized control trial manner to further elucidate khat effect on blood sugar level so that the actual effect of khat can be identified unlike in cross sectional where there may not be strong causal relationship.

Background: A high prevalence of hypogonadism among men with type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM) has been reported worldwide. This in turn creates a substantial public health burden in terms of inadequate sexual function and potential infertility. However, the status of this health problem is not well established in Ethiopia. Therefore, this study was aimed to assess hypogonadism and its associated risk factors among men with T2DM. Methods: This cross-sectional study was conducted at Tikur Anbesa Specialized Teaching Hospital in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia from February to May 2017 on 115 male patients with T2DM aged 40-80 years. Symptoms of hypogonadism were assessed using the Androgen Deficiency in Aging Men (ADAM) questionnaire. Total testosterone (TT), luteinising hormone (LH) and follicle stimulating hormone (FSH), fasting blood glucose (FBG) and lipid profiles were measured at the clinical chemistry laboratory of Ethiopian Public Health Institute. Hypogonadism was defined as the presence of clinical symptoms and low TT [TT < 12.1 nmol/l] according to International Society for the Study of the Aging Male. Results: Of the total 115 study subjects, hypogonadism was seen in 23.5%, of whom 74.1% and 25.9% had secondary and primary hypogonadism, respectively. TT showed a significant negative correlation with waist circumference (WC) (r = −0.465, p < 0.001), BMI (r = −0.363; p < 0.001), FBG (rho = −0.328, p < 0.001) and TG (rho = −0.357, p < 0.001) respectively but a significant positive correlation with HDL-C (r = 0.339, p < 0.001)]. WC and FBG were independently associated with hypogonadism. Conclusion: According to our study, visceral obesity and hyperglycaemia were found to be independent risk factors associated with hypogonadism.

The main objective of structural biology is to model proteins and other biological macromolecules and link the structural information to function and dynamics. The biological functions of protein molecules and nucleic acids are inherently dependent on their conformational dynamics. Imaging of individual molecules and their dynamic characteristics is an ample source of knowledge that brings new insights about mechanisms of action. The atomic-resolution structural information on most of the biomolecules has been solved by biophysical techniques; either by X-ray diffraction in single crystals or by nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) spectroscopy in solution. Cryo-electron microscopy (cryo-EM) is emerging as a new tool for analysis of a larger macromolecule that couldn’t be solved by X-ray crystallography or NMR. Now a day’s low-resolution Cryo-EM is used in combination with either X-ray crystallography or NMR. The present review intends to provide updated information on applications like X-ray crystallography, cryo-EM and NMR which can be used independently and/or together in solving structures of biological macromolecules for our full comprehension of their biological mechanisms.