The identification of endothelial progenitor cells (EPCs) has led to a significant paradigm in the field of vascular biology and opened a door to the development of new therapeutic approaches. Based on the current evidence, it appears that EPCs may make both direct contribution to neovascularization and indirectly promote the angiogenic function of local endothelial cells via secretion of angio...

Many diseases associated with ageing have an underlying oxidative stress and accompanying inflammatory component, for example, Alzheimer’s disease or atherosclerosis. Reviewed in this manuscript are: the role of oxidative stress in activating the transcription factor nuclear factor kappa B (NFκB), the role of NFκB in activating proinflammatory gene transcription, strong oxidants produced by cel...

To examine local and systemic oxidative status of lung cancer (LC) and oxidant effects of radiotherapy (RT), this study evaluated antioxidants and markers of oxidative and nitrosative stress in bronchoalveolar lavage (BAL) fluid and in the blood of 36 LC patients and 36 non-cancer controls at baseline and during and after RT for LC. LC patients had higher baseline serum urate, plasma nitrite an...

Aging is represented by a progressive decline in cellular functions. The age-related deformities in cardiac behaviors are the loss of cardiac myocytes through apoptosis or programmed cell death. Oxidative stress (OS) and its deleterious consequence contribute to age-related mechanical remodeling, reduced regenerative capacity, and apoptosis in cardiac tissue. The pathogenesis of OS in the elder...

Chinese medicinal herbs have been consumed for thousands of years for the purpose of healthy aging. Lycium barbarum is valued in Chinese culture for its benefits to anti-aging, vision, kidney and liver. Recent studies showed that extracts from L. barbarum possess biological activities including anti-aging, anti-tumor, immune-stimulatory and cytoprotection. Most of these studies emphasized that ...

Metabolism of oxygen by cells generates potentially deleterious reactive oxygen species (ROS). Under normal conditions the rate and magnitude of oxidant formation is balanced by the rate of oxidant elimination. However, an imbalance between prooxidants and antioxidants results in oxidative stress, which is the pathogenic outcome of oxidant overproduction that overwhelms the cellular antioxidant...