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Background: Anxiety and depression are prevalent after spinal cord injury, impairing social participation and quality of life., Objective: This study aimed to investigate the effects of traditional resistance training (TRT), flywheel resistance training (FWRT), and high-velocity resistance training (HVRT) on the mental health and quality of life in individuals with spinal cord injury., Methods: Thirty-two participants were divided into TRT (n = 12), FWRT (n = 8), and HVRT (n = 12) groups, undergoing 8 weeks of upper-limb training twice weekly under super-vision. Training intensity and volume were progressively increased. The Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale and SF-36 Questionnaire were used to assess outcomes., Results: Both the TRT and FWRT groups showed a reduction in HADS-D scores post-intervention ( p < 0.001). The TRT group also presented a significant reduction in HADS-A scores post-intervention ( p = 0.003). Concerning quality of life, after training, TRT showed improvements in social functioning ( p = 0.013), FWRT improved scores in physical functioning ( p = 0.002), bodily pain ( p = 0.002), vitality ( p = 0.046), and role emotional ( p < 0.001), while HVRT enhanced role physical ( p < 0.001), social functioning ( p = 0.013), and role emotional ( p < 0.001)., Conclusion: Overall, TRT was the most effective in reducing anxiety and depression and enhancing quality of life, while FWRT showed notable gains in physical and functional capacity. HVRT demonstrated improvements primarily in role physical but was less effective in other domains.

The present work describes the extraction of a polyprenylated benzophenone-rich extract from Brazilian red propolis (ERPB), the development and validation of an RP-HPLC-UV method to characterize it, and its evaluation against breast cancer cell lines MCF-7 and MDA-MB-231, as well as the normal counterpart MCF-10 A. A mixture of gutifferone E and xanthochymol (1+2), and isolated oblongifolin B (3) were used as chemical standards for ERPB and were also evaluated. The concentrations of 1+2 and 3 corresponded to 16.68 % and 42.25 % of the total content of the extract, respectively, and the validation parameters evaluated were satisfactorily met. The cytotoxic effects of ERPB were assessed, and the obtained IC 50 values were 19.58 μg/mL (MCF-10 A), 11.56 μg/mL (MCF-7), and 5.22 μg/mL (MDA-MB-231). In conclusion, ERPB exhibits promising cytotoxic effects on the tested breast cell lines. However, further investigation to elucidate its potential therapeutic applications and safety profile should be conducted., (© 2024 Wiley-VHCA AG, Zurich, Switzerland.)

Introduction: Fibromyalgia is a chronic syndrome characterized by constant and generalized pain associated with sleep disturbance, depression, muscle stiffness, fatigue and cognitive disorders. Among non-pharmacological treatments, physical exercise stands out as a low-cost approach., Aim: To summarize and analyze evidence on the effects of resistance training on pain, functionality and quality of life in women with fibromyalgia., Methods: Following the PRISMA method, this systematic review included clinical trials assessing the effects of resistance training on pain, quality of life and functionality in female patients with fibromyalgia, regardless age. The researches were conducted in April 2021 in PubMed, Cochrane, Web of Science and Scopus databases, using the search strategy: ("fibromyalgia") AND ("strength training" OR "resistance training") AND ("quality of life" OR "pain" OR "functionality"). This study was registered in PROSPERO (CRD number: 42,021,246,245), and the risk of bias was assessed using the Version 2 of the Cochrane Risk-of-Bias tool (RoB 2)., Results: The search resulted in 125 studies (760 women), of which 16 were eligible for this review. Risk of bias assessment resulted in high (n = 5), moderate (n = 6) and low (n = 5) risks. Resistance training has proven to be an important non-pharmacological treatment tool for fibromyalgia, reducing pain, and improving patients' functionality and quality of life., Conclusion: The available evidence suggests that resistance training performed twice weekly, with progressive loads ranging from 40 to 80% of one-repetition maximum and a total duration of 4-24 weeks, appears to be an effective and safe therapeutic approach., Competing Interests: Declaration of competing interest The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper., (Copyright © 2024 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.)

Introduction: Spinal cord injuries (SCI) have physiological, emotional, and economic consequences in the lives of affected people. Resistance training (RT) is efficient in improving several physiological factors, quality of life, and body composition. Due to the scarce literature on the analysis of isolated RT, the objective of this systematic review is to evaluate the effects of RT without the association of other techniques, in aspects related to the quality of life and body composition of people with SCI., Evidence Acquisition: The research was carried out in databases such as Pubmed, Cochrane, and Web of Science using the terms ("Spinal cord injury") AND (("Resistance Training") OR ("Strength training")). Given the lack of evidence on the subject, no deadline was set for the study to be eligible for analysis., Evidence Synthesis: The search for the articles was carried out in November of 2023 and returned 470 results, of which 315 remained after the elimination of duplicates, with 281 being excluded after title analysis. A total of 34 abstracts were analyzed and 29 studies were excluded, leaving 5 complete articles for thorough analysis., Conclusions: After analyzing the main results, we concluded that RT promotes significant improvements in body composition, pain, stress and depression symptoms, increased functionality, physical awareness, and quality of life., Competing Interests: Declaration of competing interest None, (Copyright © 2024 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.)

Background: Cutaneous leishmaniasis (CL) is an important tropical neglected disease with broad geographical dispersion. The lack of effective drugs has raised an urgent need to improve CL treatment, and antimicrobial photodynamic therapy (APDT) has been investigated as a new strategy to face it with positive outcomes. Natural compounds have emerged as promising photosensitizers (PSs), but their use in vivo remains unexplored., Purpose: In this work, we investigated the potential of three natural anthraquinones (AQs) on CL induced by Leishmania amazonensis in BALB/c mice., Study Design/methods: ANIMALS WERE INFECTED AND RANDOMLY DIVIDED INTO FOUR GROUPS: CG (control, non-treated group), G5ClSor-gL (treated with 5-chlorosoranjidiol and green LED, 520±10 nm), GSor-bL and GBisor-bL (treated with soranjidiol and bisoranjidiol, respectively, exposed to violet-blue LED, 410±10 nm). All AQs were assayed at 10 μM and LEDs delivered a radiant exposure of 45 J/cm 2 with an irradiance of 50 mW/cm 2 . We assessed the parasite burden in real time for three consecutive days. Lesion evolution and pain score were assessed over 3 weeks after a single APDT session., Results: G5ClSor-gL was able to sustain low levels of parasite burden over time. Besides, GSor-bL showed a smaller lesion area than the control group, inhibiting the disease progression., Conclusion: Taken together, our data demonstrate that monoAQs are promising compounds for pursuing the best protocol for treating CL and helping to face this serious health problem. Studies involving host-pathogen interaction as well as monoAQ-mediated PDT immune response are also encouraged., (Copyright © 2023 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.)

Diverse post-translational modifications (PTMs) regulate protein function and interaction to fine-tune biological processes. Reversible phosphorylation, cysteines (Cys) modifications, and N-linked glycosylation are all essentially involved in cellular signaling pathways, such as those initiated by the action of pro-inflammatory cytokines, which can induce pancreatic β-cell death and diabetes. Here we have developed a novel strategy for the simultaneous and comprehensive characterization of the proteome and three PTMs including reversibly modified Cysteines (rmCys), phosphorylation, and sialylated N-linked glycosylation from low amount of sample material. This strategy, termed TiCPG, is based on a combination of chemical labeling and titanium dioxide (TiO 2 ) chromatography. We applied the TiCPG strategy to study the proteome and the three PTMs changes in β-cells subject to pro-inflammatory cytokines stimulation. It enabled quantitative analysis of 8346 rmCys sites, 10,321 phosphosites and 962 sialylated N-glycosites from 5496 proteins. Significant regulation was found on 100 proteins at the expression level, while 3020 PTM peptide isoforms from 1468 proteins were significantly regulated. The three PTMs were involved in cytokine mediated β-cell apoptosis, such as the NFκB and the inducible NO synthase signaling pathways. Overall, the TiCPG strategy is a cheap, straightforward, and powerful tool for studies targeting the three PTMs described above. SIGNIFICANCE: The present study presents a fast and easy method for quantitative assessment of the proteome and three PTMs from minimal amount of sample material. This simple method provides comprehensive and significant knowledge on biological systems and cellular signaling with relatively low analysis time, suitable for younger researchers and researchers that do not have direct access to LC-MSMS in their laboratories. From sub-milligram amount of material, we were able to map known cellular signaling events of proinflammatory cytokine effect on beta-cells and to discover novel PTMs involved in several known signaling pathways., Competing Interests: Declaration of Competing Interest The authors declare no competing financial interests., (Copyright © 2022 The Authors. Published by Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.)

Introduction: Spinal cord injuries (SCI) have physiological, emotional, and economic consequences in the lives of affected people. Resistance training (RT) is efficient in improving several physiological factors, quality of life, and body composition., Evidence Acquisition: Due to the scarce literature on RT analyzed separately, the objective of this systematic review is to analyze the effects of RT with no association to other techniques, in aspects related to the quality of life and body composition of people The research for the articles was carried out in the Pubmed, Cochrane, and Web of Science databases using the terms "Spinal cord injuries" AND "Resistance Training" OR "Strength training". Given the scarcity of evidence on the subject, no deadline was set for the study to be eligible for analysis., Evidence Synthesis: The research for the articles was carried out in November of 2020 and returned 349 results, of which 220 remained after the elimination of duplicates, with 145 being excluded after title analysis. Seventy-five abstracts were analyzed and 70 studies were excluded, leaving 5 complete articles for a thorough analysis with SCI. Despite the I 2 being 87%, the meta-analysis revealed an overall effect of Z = 4.79 (P < 0.00001)., Conclusions: After analyzing the main results, we concluded that RT is feasible, secure, and promotes significant improvements in maximum strength, local muscular endurance, power, and muscular isometric voluntary contraction in people with spinal cord injury., Competing Interests: Declaration of competing interest None., (Copyright © 2021 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.)

Having recognized the value of resistance training in patients with multiple sclerosis (PwMS), there are a lack of lower limb normative reference values for one repetition maximum (1RM) and maximal voluntary isometric contraction (MVIC) in this population. Hence, the purposes of this study were to provide reference values for 1RM and MVIC of knee extensors in PwMS across the disability spectrum and to examine knee extension strength asymmetry. Three hundred and ninety PwMS participated in the study, performing MVIC and 1RM tests of bilateral (both legs together at once) and unilateral (each leg singly) knee extensors. There was no difference in 1RM according to the disease course of MS, but there was according to the degree of neurological disability, being more preserved in those with a lower degree of disability. MVIC tends to be higher in patients with relapsing-remitting MS respect those with progressive MS, and in patients with lower levels of neurological disability. Asymmetry above the values considered normal in 1RM was present in 20-60% of patients and 56-79% in the MVIC test, depending on the type of MS and tended to be lower in those with less disability. Reference values are given by quartiles for 1RM, MVIC, and asymmetry., Competing Interests: The authors do not have any potential conflict of interest.

The chemotherapy of schistosomiasis remains centered in the use of praziquantel, however, there has been growing resistant parasites to this drug. Thus, the aim of this work was to evaluate in vitro schistosomicidal activity of the hexanes/dichloromethane 1 : 1 extract of Brazilian green propolis (Pex), as well as its major isolated compounds artepillin C, caffeic acid, coumaric acid and drupanin against Schistosoma mansoni. The Pex was active by displaying an IC 50 value of 36.60 (26.26-51.13) μg mL -1 at 72 h against adult worms of S. mansoni. The major isolated compounds were inactive with IC 50 values >100 μM, however, the combination of the isolated compounds (CM) in the same range found in the extract was active with an IC 50 value of 41.17 (39.89-42.46) μg mL -1 at 72 h. Pex and CM induced alteration in the tegument of S. mansoni, and caffeic acid caused alteration in egg's maturation. Pex displayed in vitro activity against adult worms' and eggs' viability of S. mansoni, which opens new perspectives to better understand the synergistic and/or additive effects promoted by both Pex extract and CM against schistosomiasis features., (© 2020 Wiley-VHCA AG, Zurich, Switzerland.)

Background: Cutaneous leishmaniasis (CL) is a vector-borne disease caused by obligate protist parasites from the genus Leishmania. The potential toxicity as well as the increased resistance of standard treatments has encouraged the development of new therapeutical strategies. Photodynamic inactivation (PDI) combines the use of a photosensitizer and light to generate reactive oxygen species and kill cells, including microorganisms. Vegetal kingdom constitutes an important source of bioactive compounds that deserve to be investigated in the search of naturally occurring drugs with leishmanicidal activity., Purpose: The purpose of this study was to test the antiparasitic activity of PDI (ApPDI) of five natural anthraquinones (AQs) obtained from Heterophyllaea lycioides (Rusby) Sandwith (Rubiacae). To support our results, effect of AQ mediated-PDI on parasite´s morphology and AQ uptake were studied. Cytotoxicity on fibroblasts was also evaluated., Study Design/methods: Two monomers, soranjidiol (Sor) and 5-chlorosoranjidiol (5-ClSor) plus three bi-anthraquinones (bi-AQs), bisoranjidiol (Bisor), 7-chlorobisoranjidiol (7-ClBisor) and Lycionine (Lyc) were selected for this study. Recombinant L. amazonensis promastigote strain expressing luciferase was subjected to AQs and LED treatment. Following irradiation with variable light parameters, cell viability was quantified by bioluminescence. Alteration on parasite's morphology was analyzed by scanning electron microscopy (SEM). In addition, we verified the AQ uptake in Leishmania cells by fluorescence and their toxicity on fibroblasts by using MTT assay., Results: Bisor, Sor and 5-ClSor exhibited photodynamic effect on L. amazonensis. SEM showed that promastigotes treated with Bisor-mediated PDI exhibited a significant alteration in shape and size. Sor and 5-ClSor presented higher uptake levels than bi-AQs (Bisor, Lyc and 7-ClBisor). Finally, Sor and Bisor presented the lowest toxic activity against fibroblasts., Conclusion: Taking together, our results indicate that Sor presents the highest specificity towards Leishmania cells with no toxicity on fibroblasts., (Copyright © 2019 Elsevier GmbH. All rights reserved.)

Molecules from natural sources, such as essential oils, have shown activity against parasites in vitro, but have not yet been explored extensively in vivo. Anethole and carvone (10% each), encapsulated with 80% of a solid matrix, referred to as EO (encapsulated oils), were tested in vivo in 2 experiments. In Experiment 1: Lambs were artificially infected with multidrug resistant Haemonchus contortus, or left uninfected, and treated (or not) with 50 mg/kg bw (body weight) of EO in a controlled environment. Thirty-two male lambs were kept in individual cages for a period of 45 days, after which animals were evaluated for parasitological, hematological, toxicological, and nutritional parameters. After 45 days of treatment, EO at 50 mg/kg bw provided a significant (P ≤ 0.05) reduction in fecal egg count (FEC). Although FEC was reduced, animals from both treatments had similar counts of total adult worms. The low FEC was caused probably by a significant reduction (P ≤ 0.05) in both male worm size and female fecundity. Dry matter intake of uninfected controls was significantly (P ≤ 0.05) reduced, although no toxicity was observed in treated animals. Thus, in Experiment 2, conducted for five months we used an EO dose of 20 mg/kg bw. Thirty-four weaned lambs, free of parasites, were divided in two groups and kept in collective pens. One group received EO at 20 mg/kg bw mixed with concentrate for 5 months and the other was kept as a control group (CTL). Parasitological and hematological parameters as well as body weight were evaluated. In the first 2.5 months, CTL and EO groups were confined, and both presented similar clinical parameters. Then, animals were allotted to graze on contaminated pastures to acquire natural infection for the next 2.5 months. The infection was patent after 25 days and both groups had similar decreases in weight gain, increases in FEC, and decreases in blood parameters. Coprocultures from CTL and EO groups established that parasite population was 90% Haemonchus sp. We concluded that the technology of encapsulation is safe and practical to deliver to lambs at the farm level and anethole and carvone at 50 mg/kg bw caused a significant decrease in FEC and, consequently, in pasture contamination by free living stages of H. contortus. However, EO at 20 mg/kg bw was not effective to prevent or treat sheep naturally-infected with gastrointestinal nematodes., (Copyright © 2019 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.)

Background: the measurement precision of body composition can interfere on the diagnosis and prescription of diseases' treatment. Furthermore, with regard to dual energy X-rays absorptiometry (DXA), there may be important differences between the measures of regions of interest (ROI) automatically performed by DXA or manually by an evaluator, which can cause measurement error and influence the evaluation or diagnosis., Aim: thus, this study aimed to evaluate the measurement reliability of body composition by DXA and intraobserver reproducibility for the ROI measurement., Methods: a total of 15 young adults were subjected to two full-body scans by DXA, under the same conditions. The first scan of all volunteers was chosen and the extent of the ROI was performed, in two stages, separated by a period of 2 weeks, by a single trained evaluator. The coefficient of variation (CV) and intraclass correlation coefficient (ICC) were calculated with a significance level of p < 0.05., Results: high-precision measurements of DXA for whole body mass (ICC = 0.999; CV = 2.3%), fat mass (ICC = 0.998; CV = 1.6%), lean mass (ICC = 0.995; CV = 0.3%) and bone mineral content (ICC = 0.996; CV < 0.1%) were obtained. Further, it was observed high intraobserver reproducibility for ROI measurement, with ICC values ranging between 0.952 and 0.999., Conclusion: body composition measurement by DXA presents high reproducibility for whole body mass, fat mass, lean mass and bone mineral content and also high intraobserver reproducibility for the ROI measurement.

A simple, accurate, precise and sensitive high-performance liquid chromatographic (HPLC) method with ultraviolet detection was developed to quantificate lamivudine (3-TC) in human plasma samples from bioequivalence studies. 3-TC and stavudine (internal standard, I.S.) were extracted from 0.5 ml of human plasma by acetonitrile protein precipitation. The method was validated over a concentration range of 0.05-3.00 microg/ml and used in a bioequivalence trial between two lamivudine formulations, to assess its usefulness in this kind of study. FURP-lamivudine (Fundação para o Remédio Popular, Brazil, as test formulation) and Epivir (GlaxoSmithKline, Brazil, as reference formulation) were evaluated following a single 150 mg oral dose to 24 healthy volunteers of both genders. The dose was administered after an overnight fast according to a two-way crossover design. Bioequivalence between the products was determined by calculating 90% confidence intervals (90% CI) for the ratio of Cmax, AUC0-t and AUC0-inf values for the test and reference products, using logarithmic transformed data. The 90% confidence intervals for the ratio of Cmax (0.86-1.06), AUC0-t (0.96-1.04) and AUC0-inf (0.97-1.05) values for the test and reference products are within the 0.80-1.25 interval proposed by FDA and EMEA. It was concluded that the two 3-TC formulations are bioequivalent in their rate and extent of absorption, and thus, may be used interchangeably.

The aim of this study was to evaluate dental caries prevalence in the primary dentition of children with cerebral palsy, as well as to determine some possible risk factors involved in establishing this disease. From this study, it was concluded that children with cerebral palsy had greater prevalence of dental caries in the primary dentition than normal children, and that the evaluated risk factors did not influence this result.