OBJECTIVE Salivary cortisol has recently been suggested for studies on the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) axis. The lack of circadian rhythm is a marker of Cushing's syndrome (CS), and some authors have reported that low salivary cortisol levels may be a marker of adrenal insufficiency. The aim of our study was to define the role of salivary cortisol in specific diagnostic settings of HPA...

An enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay on a compact disk (CD)-type microfluidic device was developed for the simple and rapid determination of IgA in human saliva, a marker of human stress. The sample, reagent and washing solutions (IgA, HRP-labeled anti-IgA and Amplex ® Red containing H2O2) in the reservoirs on the CD-type microfluidic device were sequentially introduced into the detection chamb...

HLA genes have been shown to be strongly associated with a large repertoir of autoimmune diseases including Rheumatoid Arthritis (RA), Juvenile idiopathic arthritis (JIA) and Celiac Disease (CD). The present article will discuss what is the place of performing celiac disease associated serology in face of a rheumatologic patient, when gluten enteropaty is suspected. More specifically, should HL...

Plant growth is severely affected by toxic concentrations of the non-essential heavy metal cadmium (Cd). Comprehensive transcriptome analysis by RNA-Seq following cadmium exposure is required to further understand plant responses to Cd and facilitate future systems-based analyses of the underlying regulatory networks. In this study, rice plants were hydroponically treated with 50 µM Cd for 24 h...

An ancestral polymorphic allele of the human autophagy-related gene IRGM1 is associated with altered gene expression and a genetic risk for Crohn's Disease (CD). We used the single nucleotide polymorphism rs10065172C/T as a marker of this polymorphic allele and genotyped 370 African American and 177 Caucasian tuberculosis (TB) cases and 180 African American and 110 Caucasian controls. Among Afr...

Background  The mammary gland in humans is a dynamic organ that undergoes significant developmental changes during pregnancy, lactation, and involution. Stem cells derived from human breast milk possess the adult stem cell-like characteristics such as self-renewal, proliferative and differentiate potential. This source of stem cells avoids invasive procedures and the ethical controversy of emb...

Mantle cell lymphoma (MCL) is a very rare non-Hodgkin B-cell lymphoma, with an aggressive clinical course and poor response to conventional therapy. Few cases of "in situ" MCL were reported in the last years. We present the case of a 31-year-old woman with a unique cervical lymphadenopathy. The morphologic findings are of hyaline-vascular Castleman disease (HV-CD). Immunohistochemical stain for...

The DNA of a sulfonamide-resistant Pneumococcal strain (heterozygous for sulr-c) and that of three highly resistant and persistently heterozygous cd transformants, derived by introducing sulr-c marker into a stable sulfonamide resistant strain (sulr-d), were studied to analyze the genetic basis of their merodiploidy. The physical properties of the native and denatured DNA from the heterozygotes...

Autophagy has an important renoprotective function and we recently found that autophagy inhibition is involved in cadmium (Cd)-induced nephrotoxicity. Here, we aimed to investigate the protective effect of trehalose (Tre), a novel autophagy activator, against Cd-induced cytotoxicity in primary rat proximal tubular (rPT) cells. First, data showed that Tre treatment significantly decreased Cd-ind...