Intracellular reactive oxygen species (ROS) changes were determined by flow cytometry based on 2′,7′-dichlorofluorescein diacetate (DCFH-DA). The expression of manganese superoxide dismutase (MnSOD) was measured via quantitative real-time PCR and Western blotting analysis.

Results: Increases of apoptotic rate and ROS production were observed in pressure-treated RGC-5 cells compared to normal control cells. In contrast, pretreatment of AEA significantly

reduced the production of ROS, increased the expression of MnSOD and prevented apoptosis in pressure-treated RGC-5 cells.

Conclusions: These findings suggest that there are protective effects of ALA against PD0325901 clinical trial elevated hydrostatic pressure-induced damage in RGC-5 cells, indicating

ALA might be a potential therapeutic agent for glaucomatous optic neuropathy. (C) 2012 Elsevier Ireland Ltd. All rights reserved.”
“Purpose: CYP1B1 activates procarcinogens in some human tissues, including the urinary tract. Changes related to genetic polymorphisms are a known risk factor for cancer. We analyzed the association between CYP1B1 sequence variations and bladder cancer.

Materials and Methods: Sequence variations in the coding region (exons 2 and 3) and the neighboring introns of CYP1B1 were analyzed by direct polymerase check details chain reaction and DNA sequencing in 208 unrelated patients with bladder cancer and 208 healthy controls.

Results: We identified 6 known single nucleotide polymorphisms organized into 2 linkage disequilibrium blocks. The Ala/Ala and Leu/Val genotypes of the Ala119Ser and Leu432Val polymorphisms were significantly more common in patients than in controls (55.3% vs 42.8% and 54.8% vs 42.3%, respectively). The strongest individual single nucleotide polymorphism risk was found under an over dominant model for Leu432Val (OR 1.65, CI 95% 1.12-2.44). The 2 susceptibility single nucleotide

polymorphisms were predicted to be structured into 4 haplotypes and more than 10 diplotypes. No individual haplotype was associated with bladder cancer but the diplotype Ala-Leu/Ala-Val was significantly overrepresented in cases compared to controls (31.73% through vs 17.31%, OR 2.22, 95% CI 1.36-3.62, p = 0.001). The OR was approximately 1.6 for the individual genotypes Ala/Ala and Leu/Val, which increased to 2.2 for the Ala-Leu/Ala-Val diplotype. A risk occupation had a modifying effect, increasing the crude OR of the combined genotype Ala/Ala + Leu/Val from 2.2 to 8.3.

Conclusions: This study provides strong evidence for the role of common CYP1B1 variants as risk factors for bladder cancer, which increases with occupational exposure.”
“Antibodies are widely used for diagnostic and therapeutic applications because of their sensitive and specific recognition of a wide range of targets; however, their application is limited by their structural complexity. More demanding applications require greater stability than can be achieved by immunoglobulin-based reagents.