Ricerc@Sapienza

A growing number of evidences report that aging represents the major risk factor for the development of cardio and cerebrovascular diseases. Understanding Aging from a genetic, biochemical and physiological point of view could be helpful to design a better medical approach and to elaborate the best therapeutic strategy to adopt, without neglecting all the risk factors associated with advanced age. Of course, the better way should always be understanding risk-to-benefit ratio, maintenance of independence and reduction of symptoms.

Human Dental Pulp Stem Cells (hDPSCs) represent a type of adult mesenchymal stem cells that have the ability to differentiate in vitro in several lineages such as odontoblasts, osteoblasts, chondrocytes, adipocytes and neurons. In the current work, we used hDPSCs as the experimental model to study the role of recombinant prion protein 23–231 (recPrP C ) in the neuronal differentiation process, and in the signal pathway activation of ERK 1/2 and Akt.

Background: Organochlorine pesticides (OCPs) are widely distributed in the environment and their toxicity is mostly associated with the molecular mechanisms of endocrine disruption. Among OCPs, particular attention was focused on the effects of β-hexaclorocyclohexane (β-HCH), a widely common pollutant. A detailed epidemiological study carried out on exposed population in the “Valle del Sacco” found correlations between the incidence of a wide range of diseases and the occurrence of β-HCH contamination.

STAT3 is an oncoprotein overexpressed in different types of tumors, including prostate cancer (PCa), and its activity is modulated by a variety of post-translational modifications (PTMs). Prostate cancer represents the most common cancer diagnosed in men, and each phase of tumor progression displays specific cellular conditions: inflammation is predominant in tumor's early stage, whereas oxidative stress is typical of clinically advanced PCa.

A certain number of studies were carried out to address the question of how dysbiosis could affect the onset and development of rheumatoid arthritis (RA), but little is known about the reciprocal influence between microbiota composition and immunosuppressive drugs, and how this interaction may have an impact on the clinical outcome. The aim of this study was to characterize the intestinal microbiota in a groups of RA patients treatment-naïve, under methotrexate, and/or etanercept (ETN).

Galectin-3 (Gal-3) regulates basic cellular functions such as cell–cell and cell–matrix interactions, growth, proliferation, differentiation, and inflammation. It is not surprising, therefore, that this protein is involved in the pathogenesis of many relevant human diseases, including cancer, fibrosis, chronic inflammation and scarring affecting many different tissues. The papers published in the literature have progressively increased in number during the last decades, testifying the great interest given to this protein by numerous researchers involved in many different clinical contexts.

The complex obtained by the reaction of cisplatin and 2?-deoxyadenosine-5?-monophosphate (5?-dAMP) in water has been isolated and detected by electrospray ionization mass spectrometry. The so-formed cis-[PtCl(NH3)2(5?-dAMP)]+ complex has been studied in detail by infrared multiple photon dissociation (IRMPD) spectroscopy in two spectral ranges, namely, 700–1900 and 2800–3800 cm–1, backed by quantum-chemical calculations at the B3LYP/LACV3P/6-311G** level of theory.

In the field of solid-state chemistry, the class of materials represented by intercalation and insertion compounds (IIC) deserves particular interest for a variety of reasons. These range from the versatility of the synthetic procedures for producing IICs, to the plethora of applications in which IICs can be adopted as active functional materials.

The oxidation of a series of aryl 1-methyl-1-phenylethyl sulfides with H2O2catalyzed by the two tetradentate nonheme-iron complexes [(PDP)FeII(SbF6)2] and [(BPMCN)FeII(OTf)2] occurs by an electron transfer-oxygen transfer (ET/OT) mechanism as supported by the observation of products deriving from fragmentation of the corresponding radical cations in association with S-oxidation products (sulfoxides). © 2017 Taylor & Francis Group, LLC.

Improving the efficacy of gene therapy vectors is still an important goal toward the development of safe and efficient gene therapy treatments. S/MAR (scaffold/matrix attached region)-based vectors are maintained extra-chromosomally in numerous cell types, which is similar to viral-based vectors. Additionally, when established as an episome, they show a very high mitotic stability.