Hemodialysis exacerbates proteolytic imbalance and pro-fibrotic platelet dysfunction

Erratum: Sustained PI3K Activation exacerbates BLM-induced Lung Fibrosis via activation of pro-inflammatory and pro-fibrotic pathways

Idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis (IPF) is a life-threatening disease with limited treatment options. Additionally, the lack of a complete understanding of underlying immunological mechanisms underscores the importance of discovering novel options for therapeutic intervention. Since the PI3K/PTEN pathway in myeloid cells influences their effector functions, we wanted to elucidate how sustained PI3K...

Pro-fibrotic SNPs

Staphylococcus aureus stifles its host's immune response by producing an immunosuppressive molecule, report Thammavongsa and colleagues. The new study reveals that without the cell wall enzyme adenosine synthase A (AdsA), most staphylococci fail to thrive and cause severe disease in mice. The gene encoding AdsA contains a 5 Ј-nucleotidase domain, making it similar to a family of mammalian enzym...

Knowledge-Based Discovery of Anti-Fibrotic and Pro-Fibrotic Activities from Chinese Materia Medica

Pro-calcitonin and inflammation in chronic hemodialysis.

UNLABELLED Procalcitonin (PCT) has emerged as a marker of infection, a frequent complication in hemodialysis (HD). We analyzed PCT levels in chronic non-acutely infected HD subjects, assessed its correlation with inflammatory and nutritional markers and propose a PCT reference value for non-infected HD patients. In an observational cross-sectional study, 48 chronic HD patients and 36 controls w...

Imbalance in sex hormone levels exacerbates diabetic renal disease.

Studies suggest that the presence of testosterone exacerbates, whereas the absence of testosterone attenuates, the development of nondiabetic renal disease. However, the effects of the absence of testosterone in diabetic renal disease have not been studied. The study was performed in male Sprague-Dawley nondiabetic, streptozotocin-induced diabetic, and streptozotocin-induced castrated rats (n=1...