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Background Vaccine efficiency has a significant role in the public perception of vaccination. The current study was designed to evaluate the efficacy of COVID-19 vaccines (AZD-1222, Sputnik-V, Sinopharm, and Covaxin) and the effect of age and gender on vaccine efficacy. We evaluated the efficacy of these vaccine between 214 health care employees in Iran. Blood samples were taken from all participants at day 0 and 14 days after the second dose. Humoral responses were evaluated by SARS-CoV 2 Neutralization Ab Detection kit. Results The frequency of immunized individuals in the Sputnik V and AZD-1222 groups was 95% and 93%, respectively. This rate was 73% and 70% for Sinopharm and Covaxin vaccines. Comparison of the results obtained from the effectiveness of the vaccines between female and male groups did not demonstration a significant difference. Moreover, comparison of the results obtained from the effectiveness of vaccines between age groups showed that the rate of immunization in participants

Background: There has been an increasing prevalence of allergic disorders globally, and it may be useful to characterize the predisposing and protective factors for the development of allergy. Diet has been identified as one possible environmental factor implicated in the pathogenesis of allergic diseases. The goal of this study was to evaluate the associations between dietary patterns with the presence of allergies in a group of young women in East of Iran Methods: In total 181 female students enrolled in this study. Presence of allergic diseases including allergic rhinitis (AR), asthma and eczema was confirmed by an expert allergist. Information about dietary intake was collected by using a 65-item validated food frequency questionnaire. Exploratory factor analysis was used to evaluate the relationships among food/nutrition variables. Result: Multivariate odds ratio of having AR was 2.5 (95% CI:1.1-5.1) for the highest compared to lowest tertile of the Western dietary pattern score. But, no significant relationship was found between the traditional dietary pattern and AR, asthma or eczema. Conclusion: Our findings indicate a potential role of Western dietary pattern, characterized by being rich in dairy products, snack, nuts and sugar in the development of AR. Since diet is a modifiable impetus, the relationship between AR and Western dietary pattern may has a clinical application, particularly in those who has risk factors for developing AR.

BackgroundNatural killer (NK) cells differentiated from umbilical cord blood (UCB) hematopoietic stem cells (HSCs) may be more suitable for cell-based immunotherapy compared to NK cells from adult donors. This is due to opportunity to choose alloreactive donors and potentially more robust in vivo expansion. However, the cytotoxicity of UCB-HSC derived NK cells against cancer cells might be suboptimal. To overcome this obstacle, we attempted to generate NK cells with potent antitumor activity by targeting RAS/MAPK, IGF-1R and TGF-β signaling pathways.MethodsThe CD34+ cells isolated from human UCB mononuclear cells through MACS with purity of (≥90%) were used to be differentiated into NK cells. After 21 days of induction with SFTG36, IS721 and IL-15/Hsp70 media, NK cells phenotype was studied and their cytotoxicity against K562 human erythroleukemia cell and SKOV3 ovarian carcinoma cells was analyzed.ResultsThe induced NK cells treated with SFTG36/I721 and SFTG36/IS721 growth factor cocktail expressed a phenotype with CD56+16+CD3- and NKG2D+ with mean fluorescence intensity (MFI) of 92.7%±1.45-168.00±19.20 and 93.23%±0.75-168.66±20.00 respectively. These NK cells once activated by IL-15, demonstrated a higher cytotoxicity against K562 (≥90%) (P ≤ 0.001) and SKOV3 tumor cells (≥65%) (P ≤ 0.001) compared to IL-15/Hsp70 activated NK cells.Conclusion The differentiation of ex vivo-expanded CD34+ cells through manipulation of RAS/MAPK, IGF-1R and TGF-β signaling pathways is an efficient approach for generating functional NK cells that can be used for cancer immunotherapy.

The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) outbreak is an ongoing global health emergence, but the pathogenesis remains unclear. Here, we applied weighted gene co-expression network analysis to comprehensively characterize transcriptional changes in bronchial epithelium cells (NHBE and A549 cells) during SARS-CoV-2 infection. Our analysis identified a network highly correlated to COVID-19 pathogenicity based on MX1, IFIT1, ISG15, IFI6, DDX60, IRF9, PARP9, PGLYRP4, IL36G, SAA2 and IL-8 hub genes. The results also indicated a unique transcriptional signatures of infected cells including IFI6 and IRF9 as novel gene candidates and suggested their prospective mechanism in COVID-19 pathogenesis. The result of hub genes enrichment showed that the most correlation topic in biological process and KEGG were type I interferon signaling pathway, IL-17 signaling pathway, cytokine mediated signaling pathway, and defense response to virus categories which all play significant roles in restricting viral infection. Also according to the drug-target network, we recognized 54 FDA-approved drug candidates for other indications could potentially use for the treatment of COVID-19 patients through regulation of six hub genes of the co-expression network. Our findings also showed that the 19 experimentally validated miRNAs regulated the co-expression network through 5 hub genes (SLC19A3, FAM13A, PLA2G16, and HRASLS5). In conclusion, these hub genes had potential roles in the translational medicine and might become promising therapeutic targets further in vitro and in vivo experimental studies are needed to evaluate the role of above mentioned genes in COVID-19.