Shandong Academy of Chinese Medicine

Detecting mitochondrial Complex I protein glutathionylation in peripheral blood is crucial for preventing myocardial infarction, highlighting its role as a key oxidative stress biomarker in cardiovascular disease. Our study introduces a novel molecular probe for quantitative analysis, enhancing early diagnosis and treatment strategies. This probe integrates a mitochondrial targeting sequence for heightened sensitivity, ensuring precise detection. Leveraging Complex I's redox catalytic activity enables signal amplification, facilitating robust detection in complex clinical matrices. It represents a promising step in cardiovascular disease management, offering early identification of pathophysiological markers relevant to myocardial infarction risk assessment and prevention. Our approach focuses on respiratory chain Complex I proteins and their oxidative modifications, providing insights into oxidative stress levels and myocardial infarction risk. The peptide-based molecular probe integrates functional sequences targeting Complex I and copper ions for effective interaction and immobilization on a conductive substrate. By harnessing Complex I's redox activity and employing catalytic cycles with nicotinamide adenine dinucleotide, our method enhances sensitivity and specificity in detecting pathological glutathionylation under oxidative stress, validated with clinical samples demonstrating robust detection capabilities for clinical diagnostics and risk assessment.

Licorice is a well-known homologous substance of medicine and food, which has many biological activities, including anti-inflammatory, regulating immunity, etc. According to TCM theory, honey-processed licorice (HPL) is effective in regulating the spleen deficiency syndrome but the mechanism was not clear. In this study, we integrated multi-omics, UHPLC-QTOF-MS and molecular docking to decrypt the metabolic reprogramming mechanism and material basis of HPL in treating spleen deficiency. The main regulated pathway was primary bile acid biosynthesis pathway. The HPL may play a crucial role of anti-spleen deficiency by regulating the content of Taurochenodeoxycholate (TCDCA) to affect the primary bile acid biosynthesis with the content of TCDCA changed significantly according to the results of metabolomic. Furthermore, 70 compounds were identified from HPL using UHPLC-QTOF-MS, among which 18β-glycyrrhetinic, isoliquiritin and liquiritigenin have binding activity with key proteins (CYP7A1, CYP8B1, AKR1D1 and HSD3B7), which may serve as the active ingredients for the intervention of spleen deficiency. Our study demonstrated the potential therapeutic effects of HPL in rats with spleen deficiency, and further investigated the possible material basis and its molecular mechanism. And provide certain experimental basis to clarify the anti-spleen deficiency effect of HPL and the mechanisms involved.

d-Tagatose is a low-calorie rare sugar with notable physiological benefits. The recombinant Bacillus subtilis expressing L-arabinose isomerase (LAI) was constructed and used together with lactase for biotransformation of d-tagatose from cheap substrate of lactose. Under optimum conditions, 45.6 g/L d-tagatose was produced from 200 g/L lactose, achieving a conversion yield of 0.228 g d-tagatose/g lactose. d-Glucose produced by lactose hydrolysis was removed by anaerobic fermentation with Saccharomyces cerevisiae. Subsequently, the sugar solution containing d-galactose and d-tagatose was decolorized by using powdered activated carbon, desalinated by anion and cation exchange resin beds, and separated by chromatographic column, resulting in decolorization rate of 95.5 %, desalinization rate of 93.8 % and d-tagatose solution purity of 97.9 %. Finally, the separated d-tagatose solution was concentrated and crystallized, resulting in d-tagatose crystals with 99.9 % purity. In summary, this paper establishes a complete bioprocess for d-tagatose from lactose catalyzed by using recombinant B. subtilis and lactase. The methods developed in this study show promise for mass production of food-grade d-tagatose from the inexpensive substrate lactose.