Mini-PCNL is safe and effective for managing renal calculi in adult patients. Although smaller working sheath is associated with longer operative time, Mini-PCNL has significantly lower incidence of bleeding necessitating transfusion and higher stone-free rate for multiple caliceal stones in comparison with the standard PCNL.

Scope Acute kidney injury (AKI) is the most frequent and serious complication in sepsis, a potentially deadly inflammatory response induced by bacterial, viral or fungal infection. Lipopolysaccharide (LPS) induced AKI is associated with an abnormal inflammatory response, including renal endothelial dysfunction and renal inflammation. Resveratrol, a natural phytoalexin with low toxicity and anti-inflammatory properties, is known to protect endothelial cells and modulate the immune response in sepsis. Methods and results This study investigates the potential protective effects of resveratrol on AKI induced by LPS exposure of mice. Resveratrol was administered as a pre- and post-treatment, or as a post-treatment alone following LPS injection and compared to control groups. Resveratrol significantly improved kidney function and lowered serum and kidney tissue inflammatory cytokine levels. Consistently, resveratrol prevented endotoxin-induced disruption of endothelial cell permeability and inhibited inflammation of kidney tissue. Resveratrol treatment attenuated the effects of LPS on macrophages, with significant inhibition of activation, cytokine release and TLR4 activation. Resveratrol treatment also resulted in decreased expression of iNOS, Bcl-2 and Bcl-xL in macrophages, which was linked with induction of apoptosis in macrophages. Conclusion Our studies suggest that resveratrol might represent a novel therapeutic agent to prevent and treat sepsis induced AKI.

Although miR-193a-3p has been found to be dysregulated in variety of human tumors, little is known about its role in renal cell carcinoma. This study was designed to investigate the function and underlying mechanism of miR-193a-3p in human renal cell carcinoma tissues and cell lines. Here, we demonstrated that the expression of miR-193-3p was increased in renal cell carcinoma tissues and cell lines. In addition, knockdown of miR-193a-3p significantly inhibited cell proliferation and colony formation and induced cells into G1 phase arrest. Meanwhile, the migration potential of 786-O cells was also decreased compared to control group. Furthermore, we identified PTEN as a direct and functional target of miR-193a-3p, at least partly responsible for promoting tumor effect of miR-193a-3p in renal cell carcinoma. Taken together, the findings indicated for the first time that miR-193a-3p functions as a tumor-promoting microRNA by directly targeting PTEN in renal cell carcinoma.

Renal cell carcinoma (RCC) microenvironment plays critical roles in antitumor immune response. Resveratrol exhibits a direct antitumor effect in various tumor models. However, the immunomodulatory effect of resveratrol on RCC microenvironment is unknown. In this study, we found that administration of low dose of resveratrol inhibits Renca tumor growth and its inhibition effect depends on CD8(+) T cells. Moreover, the proportion of regulatory T cells is decreased, while the proportion of myeloid-derived suppressor cells does not alter after resveratrol treatment. More importantly, massive amount of activated CD8(+) T cells accumulates in tumor microenvironment in the resveratrol-treated group and shows increased cytotoxicity, as indicated by a higher expression of Fas ligand. We also found that resveratrol switches the expression of T-helper (Th) 2 cytokines such as interleukin (IL)-6 and IL-10 to Th 1 cytokines with dominance of interferon (IFN)-γ, which increases the expression of Fas in Renca cells. Furthermore, we found resveratrol down-regulates angiogenesis along with decreased level of vascular endothelial growth factor in tumor microenvironment. Our results strongly suggest that resveratrol might be used for RCC immunotherapy through modulating tumor microenvironment.

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