No abstract

Expression of apoA-I or ABCA1 can reduce steatosis by decreasing lipid storage in hepatocytes through lipid transport and may also reduce endoplasmic reticulum stress, further lessening hepatic steatosis.

Parkinson's disease (PD) is a neurodegenerative movement disorder that is characterized by the progressive degeneration of the dopaminergic (DA) pathway. Mesenchymal stem cells derived from human umbilical cord (hUC-MSCs) have great potential for developing a therapeutic agent as such. HGF is a multifunctional mediator originally identified in hepatocytes and has recently been reported to possess various neuroprotective properties. This study was designed to investigate the protective effect of hUC-MSCs infected by an adenovirus carrying the HGF gene on the PD cell model induced by MPP+ on human bone marrow neuroblastoma cells. Our results provide evidence that the cultural supernatant from hUC-MSCs expressing HGF could promote regeneration of damaged PD cells at higher efficacy than the supernatant from hUC-MSCs alone. And intracellular free Ca2+ obviously decreased after treatment with cultural supernatant from hUC-MSCs expressing HGF, while the expression of CaBP-D28k, an intracellular calcium binding protein, increased. Therefore our study clearly demonstrated that cultural supernatant of MSC overexpressing HGF was capable of eliciting regeneration of damaged PD model cells. This effect was probably achieved through the regulation of intracellular Ca2+ levels by modulating of CaBP-D28k expression.

BackgroundTo evaluate the efficacy of combined treatment with bone marrow mesenchymal stem cell (BMSC) transplantation and methylprednisolone (MP) to treat paraquat (PQ)-induced acute lung injury.Materials and methodsA total of 102 female rats were randomly divided into five groups: PQ, BMSC, MP, BMSC + MP and normal control. After 14 days of PQ poisoning, the survival of rats, wet/dry weight ratio of lung tissue, serum levels of tumor necrosis factor (TNF)-α, interleukin (IL)-1β, IL-6, IL-10, malondialdehyde (MDA) and superoxidase dismutase (SOD), and the expression of nuclear factor (NF)-кB p65 in lung tissue were determined.ResultsRats in BMSC and BMSC + MP groups survived. BMSC transplantation significantly decreased the wet/dry weight ratio of lung tissue, down-regulated NF-кB p65 expression in lung tissue, lowered serum levels of TNF-α, IL-1β, IL-6 and MDA, and increased serum levels of IL-10 and SOD. These changes were particularly significant on days 7–14 after PQ poisoning. The above changes were more significant in the MP group on days 1–3 after PQ poisoning, compared with those of the BMSC group. However, the BMSC + MP group showed more significant changes on days 1–14 after PQ poisoning than those of both BMSC and MP groups.ConclusionsMP inhibits the inflammatory response, reduces the products of lipid peroxidation and promotes survival of transplanted BMSC, thus improving the intermediate and longer term efficacy of BMSC transplantation for treatment of PQ-induced lung injury.