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The cure from cancer is still not a reality for all patients, which is mainly due to the limitations of chemotherapy (e.g., drug resistance and toxicity). Apart from the highthroughput screening of synthetic chemical libraries, natural products represent attractive alternatives for drug development. We have done a systematic bioactivitybased screening of natural products derived from medicinal plants used in traditional Chinese medicine. Plant extracts with growth-inhibitory activity against tumor cells have been fractionated by chromatographic techniques. We have isolated the bioactive compounds and elucidated the chemical structures by nuclear magnetic resonance and mass spectrometry. By this strategy, we identified 25-O-acetyl-23,24-dihydro-cucurbitacin F as a cytotoxic constituent of Quisqualis indica. Another promising compound identified by this approach was miltirone from Salvia miltiorrhiza. The IC 50 values for miltirone of 60 National Cancer Institute cell lines were associated with the microarray-based expression of 9,706 genes. By COMPARE and hierarchical cluster analyses, candidate genes were identified, which significantly predicted sensitivity or resistance of cell lines to miltirone. [Mol Cancer Ther 2008; 7(1):152-61]

Herbal medicine is one of the forms of traditional medical practice. Traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) and traditional Vietnamese medicine (TVM) are well-known for their long-standing tradition of herbal medicine.Secreted by many species of blister beetle, most notably by the 'Spanish fly' (Lytta vesicatoria), cantharidin inhibits protein phosphatases 1 and 2A (PP1, PP2A). Blister beetle has been used in Asian traditional medicine to treat Molluscum contagiosum virus (MCV) infections and associated warts, and is now also used for cancer treatment. A combination of both genomic and postgenomic techniques was used in our studies to identify candidate genes affecting sensitivity or resistance to cantharidin. Cantharidin was not found to be related to multidrug resistance phenotype, suggesting its potential usefulness for the treatment of refractory tumors. Oxidative stress response genes diminish the activity of cantharidin by inducing DNA strand breaks which may be subject to base excision repair and induce apoptosis in a p53- and Bcl2-dependent manner.Cantharidin is one of many natural products used in traditional Chinese medicine and traditional Vietnamese medicine for cancer treatment. Combined methods of pharmaceutical biology and molecular biology can help elucidate modes of action of these natural products.

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SummaryEffective control and monitoring of foot‐and‐mouth disease (FMD) relies upon rapid and accurate disease confirmation. Currently, clinical samples are usually tested in reference laboratories using standardized assays recommended by The World Organisation for Animal Health (OIE). However, the requirements for prompt and serotype‐specific diagnosis during FMD outbreaks, and the need to establish robust laboratory testing capacity in FMD‐endemic countries have motivated the development of simple diagnostic platforms to support local decision‐making. Using a portable thermocycler, the T‐COR™ 8, this study describes the laboratory and field evaluation of a commercially available, lyophilized pan‐serotype‐specific real‐time RT‐PCR (rRT‐PCR) assay and a newly available FMD virus (FMDV) typing assay (East Africa‐specific for serotypes: O, A, Southern African Territories [SAT] 1 and 2). Analytical sensitivity, diagnostic sensitivity and specificity of the pan‐serotype‐specific lyophilized assay were comparable to that of an OIE‐recommended laboratory‐based rRT‐PCR (determined using a panel of 57 FMDV‐positive samples and six non‐FMDV vesicular disease samples for differential diagnosis). The FMDV‐typing assay was able to correctly identify the serotype of 33/36 FMDV‐positive samples (no cross‐reactivity between serotypes was evident). Furthermore, the assays were able to accurately detect and type FMDV RNA in multiple sample types, including epithelial tissue suspensions, serum, oesophageal–pharyngeal (OP) fluid and oral swabs, both with and without the use of nucleic acid extraction. When deployed in laboratory and field settings in Tanzania, Kenya and Ethiopia, both assays reliably detected and serotyped FMDV RNA in samples (n = 144) collected from pre‐clinical, clinical and clinically recovered cattle. These data support the use of field‐ready rRT‐PCR platforms in endemic settings for simple, highly sensitive and rapid detection and/or characterization of FMDV.