Momordica charantia (bitter gourd) has been used in the traditional system of medicine for the treatment of various diseases. Anticancer activity of M. charantia extracts has been demonstrated by numerous in vitro and in vivo studies. In the present study, we investigated the differentiation inducing potential of fractionated M. charantia seed extracts in human myeloid HL60 cells. We found that the HL60 cells treated with the fractionated seed extracts differentiated into granulocytic lineage as characterized by NBT staining, CD11b expression, and specific esterase activity. The differentiation inducing principle was found to be heat-stable, and organic in nature. The differentiation was accompanied by a downregulation of c-myc transcript, indicating the involvement of c-myc pathway, at least in part, in differentiation. Taken together these results indicate that fractionated extracts of M. charantia seeds possess differentiation inducing activity and therefore can be evaluated for their potential use in differentiation therapy for leukemia in combination with other inducers of differentiation.

Background:Peptic ulcer disease (PUD), encompassing gastric and duodenal ulcers is the most prevalent gastrointestinal disorder. The pathophysiology of PUD involves an imbalance between offensive factors like acid, pepsin and defensive factors like nitric oxide and growth factors. The clinical evaluation of antiulcer drugs showed tolerance, incidence of relapses and side-effects that make their efficacy arguable. An indigenous drug like Musa sapientum possessing fewer side-effects is the major thrust area of present day research, aiming at a better and safer approach for the management of PUD.Material and Methods:The unripe plantain bananas (Musa sapientum) were shade-dried, powdered and used for phytochemical analysis and as antiulcer drug. In our present study Group I rats served as control and were treated with saline, Group II was indomethacin-induced ulcerated rats, Group III received aqueous extract of Musa sapientum along with indomethacin and Group IV received esomeprazole along with indomethacin for 21 days. The anti-ulcerogenic activity was investigated by performing hematological, mucosal, antioxidant profile in comparison with the standard drug esomeprazole.Results:Our findings from High - Performance Thin Layer Chromatography (HPTLC) analysis showed that Musa sapientum has an active compound a monomeric flavonoid (leucocyanidin) with anti-ulcerogenic activity. Results were expressed as mean ± SD. All our results are in congruous with the results of standard drug esomeprazole.Conclusion:It could be clearly concluded that administration of the aqueous extract of Musa sapientum at the dose used in this study tends to ameliorate ulcers. Its use in indigenous medicine should be scientifically scrutinized with further research.

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Deep exome resequencing is a powerful approach for delineating patterns of protein-coding variation among genes, pathways, individuals and populations. We analyzed exome data from 2,440 individuals of European and African ancestry as part of the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute's Exome Project, the aim of which is to discover novel genes and mechanisms that contribute to heart, lung and blood disorders. Each exome was sequenced to a mean coverage of 116×, allowing detailed inferences about the population genomic patterns of both common variation and rare coding variation. We identifi ed more than 500,000 single nucleotide variations, the majority of which were novel and rare (76% of variants had a minor allele frequency of less than 0.1%), refl ecting the recent dramatic increase in the size of the human population. The unprecedented magnitude of this dataset allowed us to rigorously characterize the large variation in nucleotide diversity among genes (ranging from 0 to 1.32%), as well as the role of positive and purifying selection in shaping patterns of proteincoding variation and the diff erential signatures of population structure from rare and common variation. This dataset provides a framework for personal genomics and is an important resource that will allow inferences of broad importance to human evolution and health. I2Abstract not submitted for online publication. I3Are clinical genomes already becoming semi-routine for patient care? Mark Boguski Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA Genome Biology 2011, 12(Suppl 1):I16 Hardly a month goes by without a new published report of a patient's genome being used diagnostically for clinical management in a diverse spectrum of disease areas, including gastroenterology, nephrology, neurology and oncology. The impression is that clinical genomics is already becoming semiroutine. However, a large and complex set of non-technical barriers needs to be overcome before genomics can truly be integrated into the practice of medicine and made widely available for patient care. Through the use of case studies, my presentation will elucidate issues relating to the needs and requirements of the workforce, the legal and regulatory aspects of 'laboratorydeveloped tests' and insurance reimbursement for 'multi-analyte diagnostics' . The roles of the Food and Drug Administration, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services and the College of American Pathologists will be highlighted. I4Interrogating the architecture of cancer genomes Peter Campbell Cancer Genome Project, Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute, Hinxton, UK Genome Biology 2011, 12(Suppl 1):I11Cancer is driven by mutation. Using massively parallel sequencing technology, we can now sequence the entire genome of cancer samples, allowing the generation of comprehensive catalogs of somatic mutations of all classes. Bespoke algorithms have been developed to identify somatically acquired point mutations, copy number changes and genomic rearrangements, which require extensive validation by confi rmatory testing. The ...