Current Pharmaceutical Design - Volume 28, Issue 30, 2022

Alzheimer’s disease accounts for a high percentage of dementia cases in elderly individuals. This type of brain disease is caused by damage to the brain cells affecting the ability of the patients to communicate, as well as their thinking, behavior, and feelings. Although numerous research laboratories focus on advancements in treating Alzheimer’s disease, the currently approved pharmacological approaches seem to only alleviate the symptoms. Consequently, there is an urgent need for alternative pharmacological options that can prevent the progressive impairment of neurons. Natural substances were used in ancient times to treat various disorders given their biological activities such as antioxidant, anti-inflammatory, and antiapoptotic properties. Besides, their cost-effectiveness and accessibility to anyone who needs them are their most significant characteristics. Therefore, the possible use of phytochemical compounds for the possible management or even prevention of Alzheimer’s disease is currently under investigation. This review article summarizes the present status of Alzheimer’s disease diagnosis and underlying mechanisms, the potential phytochemicals and their carriers, along with future perspectives. In the future, natural substances can play a role as an adjunct therapy for neurodegenerative forms of dementia, such as Alzheimer’s disease.

Background: Nucleic acid-based carbohydrate sensors (NAbCSs) constitute a strategy involving nucleic acids as recognition elements for the development of a unique, stable, sensitive, mono- or multimodal detection system in the field of nanomedicine, gas sensing, and gene therapy. Thus, this advanced platform for next-generation investigation compromises cost-effective, wearable, and noninvasive sensing devices as diagnostics in healthcare. Objective: This review article highlights the importance of NAbCSs and explores the novel applications of sensors fabricated via the conjugation of nucleic acids and carbohydrates. Additionally, advances in smart portable devices, like smartphones, printers, and digital multimeters, are summarized, followed by the challenges involved in the development of futuristic sensing tools. Methods: A novel platform has been unfolded for the detection of different chemical toxins (like aflatoxin B1, ochratoxin A) and biomarkers (like miRNA in cancer) present in biosamples, food and biowarfare agents. The potential applications of biosensing in the areas of miniaturization, reusability, rapid, point-of-care or portable for home analysis techniques, cost-effective, eco-friendly, high throughput and personalized sensors for qualitative analysis of target analyte/s in bio-fluids and food have been explored. Conclusion: NAbCSs provide real-time monitoring of biosamples qualitatively and semi-quantitatively (luminometer, fluorimeter, etc.) in the absence of trained personnel. Explorations of NAbCSs encompass advantages in remote resource-limited access areas with simultaneous monitoring via smart devices for multiple analytes with greater precision, sensitivity, and selectivity.

Feeding pattern is related to health status or chronic diseases, and this depends on the individual’s eating habits. Feeding organized with the right time to start and end during the day, promotes an internal biological rhythm, favoring molecular synchronization of the clock genes, which impose an effect on metabolism and immune cells, creating a physiological response related to a healthy profile. On the other hand, a feeding pattern disorganized, without the right time to start and end eating during the day, might lead to nonsynchronization of the clock genes, a disruption condition, which is related to chronic diseases, such as obesity and diabetes type 2. A strategy that should be adopted to favor molecular synchronization is time-restricted eating (TRE), which can organize the initial and end of the eating patterns during the day. Our review points out some cues that suggest TRE as an efficient strategy for healthy profile and can be a good intervention for the treatment of chronic diseases.

Background: The presentation of 3D printing in drug innovation especially focuses on the advancement of patient-centered dosage forms based on the structural design. Rising interest for customization of 3D printed inserts during surgeries combined with developing R speculations is driving the medical services. 3D printing technique is considered emerging digitized technology and it is beneficial for the future progression and development of customized dosage forms, prostheses, implantable medical devices, tissue making, disease modeling, and many more. 3D Printing technology has numerous benefits, such as minimum waste production, freedom of design, and the ability to make complex structures as well as rapid prototyping. Methods: Various 3D printing techniques are utilized (such as drop on solid deposition, selective laser sintering/ melting, drop on drop deposition, stereolithography, fused deposition modeling, and pressure-assisted techniques) for the preparation of various pharmaceuticals, such as tablets, films, oral films, mouth guards, pellets, polyprintlets, catheters, etc. Results: With the help of various 3D printing techniques, researchers minimize dose frequency and side effects of drugs with the formation of multilayer tablets or polypills and benefit the person who is suffering from various diseases at a particular time. For example, multilayer polypills containing paracetamol, caffeine, naproxen, chloramphenicol, prednisolone, and aspirin. This study, most importantly, demonstrated the possibility of 3D printing for making diverse polypills to advance patient personalization with the help of the 3D printing technique. Conclusion: The authors hope this article will give a valuable boost to energize future researchers in the pharmaceutical field. Due to the novelty and particular highlights, 3D printing has the inborn ability to settle numerous formulation and medication conveyance challenges, which are often connected with poorly aqueous solubility. It has many unmet regulatory challenges that need to be addressed.

Background: Acute lung injury (ALI) is a serious respiratory disease with a high mortality rate, and there is an urgent need for a more effective treatment strategy. Andrographolide derivative AL-1 has been identified to possess anti-inflammatory activity. However, whether it could reduce LPS-induced lung injury in mice through inhibiting NLRP3 inflammasome activation and protecting lung permeability has not yet been elucidated. In the present research, we investigated the protective effect of AL-1 on ALI mice and demonstrated the potential mechanisms. Methods: Male Balb/c mice were anesthetized with isoflurane, and ALI mice were induced by intratracheal instillation of LPS. The mice were euthanized after LPS administration for 12 h, then bronchoalveolar lavage fluid (BALF) and lung tissues were collected. The levels of inflammatory factors were measured by ELISA assay, and HE staining and lung injury scoring were used to evaluate the pathological changes in the pulmonary tissues. Immunohistochemistry and immunofluorescence examination were conducted to detect the expression levels of related proteins. Western blot was performed to measure the levels of NLRP3 inflammasome and tight junction proteins. Results: The study indicated that AL-1 effectively alleviated lung injury by reduction of proinflammatory cytokine levels, MPO activity, lung W/D ratio, and total protein levels. Furthermore, AL-1 improved pathological changes in lung tissue and significantly reduced the infiltration of inflammatory cells. Administration with AL-1 markedly inhibited the expression of NLRP3, ASC, Caspase-1, IL-1β, gasdermin D (GSDMD), and VCAM-1 but increased the expression of ZO-1, Occludin, JAM-A, and Claudin-1. Conclusion: Taken together, these results demonstrated that AL-1 ameliorated pulmonary damage by inhibiting the activation of the NLRP3 inflammasome pathway and restoring TJ protein expression.