Current Medicinal Chemistry - Volume 28, Issue 36, 2021

Mucous epithelia are protected by complex mucus barrier layers, which are part of the innate immune defense. Trefoil factor family peptides TFF1, TFF2, and TFF3 have lectin activities and are predominantly co-secreted together with mucins from these epithelia. TFF1 and TFF2 are mainly expressed in the gastric mucosa, whereas TFF3 is widely secreted from most mucous epithelia and their glands. TFF1 and TFF3 consist o Read More

Background: Hypertrophic Cardiomyopathy (HCM) is the most common inherited Cardiomyopathy. The hallmark of HCM is myocardial fibrosis that contributes to heart failure, arrhythmias and sudden cardiac death. Objective: Currently, there are no reliable serum biomarkers for the detection of myocardial fibrosis, while cardiac magnetic resonance (CMR) is an imaging technique to detect myocardial fibrosis. MicroRNAs (miRN Read More

Considerable evidence has proved that disturbed cholesterol metabolism played a crucial role in diabetic kidney disease. Besides, massive cholesterol depositions were found in intrinsic renal cells of diabetic kidney disease patients and animal models, causing cytotoxicity and affecting renal function. Statins could alleviate cholesterol depositions, podocyte injury, and microalbuminuria of diabetic kidney disease. In this re Read More

Cardiovascular disease (CVD) remains the primary cause of global morbidity and mortality. CVD includes various life-threatening conditions such as myocardial infarction, stroke and peripheral arterial diseases. In this context, atherosclerosis continues to play the principal role in the pathogenesis of these conditions. Atherosclerosis emanates from a set of modifiable and non-modifiable risk factors that include age, male gender, fa Read More

Proprotein convertase subtilisin/Kexin type 9 (PCSK9) is a secretory serine protease that plays multiple biological functions in the regulation of physiological and pathological processes. PCSK9 inhibitors decrease the circulating LDL-cholesterol level with well-known preventive and therapeutic effects on atherosclerosis (AS). Still, increasing evidence shows that the direct impact of PCSK9 on the vascular wall also pla Read More

The translation of nanomedicines from the lab level into marketed product faces several challenges, including characterization of physicochemical properties, pharmacodynamics, pharmacokinetics, process control, biocompatibility, and nanotoxicity, scaling-up as well as reproducibility. The challenges of nanomedicine development are in connection with the different requirements from the patient (clinical and therapeutic us Read More

Background: Oxidative stress and free radicals are harmful to human health. Reactive oxygen species are the major source of oxidative stress and are one of the major causes of cancer development. Cancer is one of the leading causes of death worldwide. Prolonged use of synthetic chemotherapeutic due to their low bioavailability leads to systemic toxic side effects. To surmount this problem, the use of antioxidants i Read More

Chagas Disease, also known as American trypanosomiasis, is a Neglected Tropical Disease that affects around seven million people, especially in Latin America. Noteworthy, there has been an increase in the numbers of case reports in non-endemic areas, such as North America, Europe, Japan, and Australia. The disease is a vector-borne disease caused by the pathogen Trypanosoma cruzi being transmitted by infected bu Read More

Gene therapy is one of the most important developments for modern medicine. As such methods for the compaction and delivery of nucleic acids bearing therapeutic sequences is essential. The quest for non-viral carriers of nucleic acids has produced a number of possible candidates with dendrimer being among the most promising. Their hyper-branched structure and well-defined size together with low cytotoxicity has fou Read More

Human African and American trypanosomiasis are the vector-borne parasitic diseases that have killed millions of people early, and many people are yet suffering from these neglected diseases. The causative agents of these infections are parasitic protozoans of the genus Trypanosoma. Current treatment regimens against these endemic diseases have several limitations in terms of safety, efficacy, route of administration Read More

Background: Studies on the prognostic value of homocysteine level have yielded controversial results in patients with acute ischemic stroke (AIS). The aim of this meta-analysis was to evaluate the prognostic utility of homocysteine among patients with AIS in terms of recurrent stroke, poor functional outcome or all-cause mortality. Methods: Two independent authors searched the articles published in PubMed and Embase da Read More