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Tranquilizing medicinal plants: their CNS effects and active constituents - Our experience
No full textMental disorder is a psychological or behavioral pattern that occurs in an individual and is thought to cause distress or disability that is not expected as part of normal development or culture. Mental and neurological disorders are highly prevalent worldwide with 450 million people estimated to be suffering from them. They are responsible for about one per cent of deaths and they account for almost eleven per cent of disease burden the world over. Magnitude of neurological disorders is huge and they are priority health problems globally. The extension of life expectancy and the ageing of the general populations in both developed and developing countries are likely to increase the prevalence of many chronic and progressive physical and mental conditions including neurological disorders. The proportionate share of the total global burden of disease due to neuropsychiatric disorders is projected to rise to 14.7% by 2020 (World Health Organization, WHO). There are many different categories of mental disorders, and many different facets of human behavior and personality that can become disordered. Mental illnesses are classified according to the symptoms that a patient experiences, as well as the clinical features of the illness. Some of the major categories of mental illness include anxiety disorders, cognitive disorders, developmental disorders, dissociative disorders, mood disorders, personality disorders, schizophrenia and substance abuse disorders. Anxiety is defined as a subjective emotional state of uneasiness, not pleasant and even fearful. When the anxiety reaches pathological levels the subject experiments conductual changes, apprehension, motor troubles, sweating, hypertension, etc. The term sedation implies a general slowing down of cognitive functioning, whereas a hypnotic specifically means the induction of sleep itself. Tranquilization, on the other hand, signifies emotional calming, that may or may not lead to sleep, but does not induce the feeling of drowsiness. So calmness of mind may the better facilitate normal physiological sleep mechanisms to function; whilst stress of any kind will mediate against them. Traditional medicine has many cures for these ailments, most of them based on herbal preparations, but also modern medicinal chemistry has provided several drugs which are more or less effective, for the same purpose. The most spectacular success was achieved in 1957 with the synthesis of the benzodiazepines (Sternbach 1978), which still are, after 50 years of intense clinical research and use, the near-best medication to treat mental disorders. Benzodiazepines, however, also produce several side-effects like sedation, muscle relaxation, alcohol incompatibility, amnesia and addiction (Woods et al. 1992). These drawbacks have to be carefully considered in clinical therapeutical applications. Although benzodiazepines are laboratory products they were found also in nature and, appropriately, their first detection was in the mammalian brain (Sangameswaran et al. 1986). They were then identified in many other sources like foods; rumen, plasma and cow´s and human´s milk (Medina and Paladini 1993). When we attempted detection of benzodiazepines in several plants, including some used to prepare tranquilizing infusions, unexpectedly discovered that some flavonoids present in them, were ligands for the benzodiazepine binding site of the gamma amino butyric acid receptor type A (GABAA) (Medina et al. 1989 and the reviews: Medina et al., 1997 and 1998; Paladini et al., 1999; Marder and Paladini 2002). A search for novel pharmacotherapy from medicinal plants for psychiatric illnesses has progressed significantly in the last twenty years. This is reflected in the large number of herbal preparations for which psychotherapeutic potential has been evaluated in a variety of animal models. A considerable number of herbal constituents whose behavioral effects and pharmacological actions have been well characterized may be good candidates for further investigations that may ultimately result in clinical use. Herbal remedies that have demonstrable psychotherapeutic activities have provided a potential to psychiatric pharmaceuticals and deserve increased attention in future studies. This chapter deals with plants possessing central nervous system (CNS) effects. However, because of the huge amount of plants belonging to this category, we decided to select a few plants and to focus our attention on them, mostly concerning the constituents that have significant therapeutic effects in animal models of CNS disorders.Fil: Marder, Nora Mariel. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Oficina de Coordinación Administrativa Houssay. Instituto de Química y Físico-Química Biológicas "Prof. Alejandro C. Paladini". Universidad de Buenos Aires. Facultad de Farmacia y Bioquímica. Instituto de Química y Físico-Química Biológicas; ArgentinaFil: Wasowski, Cristina Lucia N.. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Oficina de Coordinación Administrativa Houssay. Instituto de Química y Físico-Química Biológicas "Prof. Alejandro C. Paladini". Universidad de Buenos Aires. Facultad de Farmacia y Bioquímica. Instituto de Química y Físico-Química Biológicas; Argentin
Potential of Nutraceuticals against Obesity Complications
No full textObesity has been regarded as a disease by the World Health Organisation (WHO) since its inception in 1948; however, it was not deemed a public health problem by WHO until 1997 (James 2008). The most widely used method of classifying overweight and obesity is by body mass index (BMI = weight/ height2), and those with a BMI of 25-29.99 kg/m2 are classified as overweight and those with a BMI of ≥30 kg/m2 as obese (WHO 2011). However, although BMI correlates with body fat it is not a direct measure and results may be skewed by a high muscle mass such as can be seen in some athletes.sch_diepub3347pu
Colorectal cancer : Current status of preclinical research
No full textColorectal cancer (CRC) is the third most prevalent cancer worldwide and the second major cause of cancer-related mortality. The continual search for better comprehension of the molecular processes underlying the onset, progression, and drug resistance of the disease has been very crucial for current therapeutic options and the ones at various stages of development. Current CRC management strategies apply the principle of chemotherapy, targeted therapy, or immunotherapy, and the decision to use any of these or a combination depends on the specific molecular characteristics of the tumor and individual patient factors. A large portion of the current preclinical research on colorectal cancer is focused on finding novel targets and biomarkers. Preclinical research into CRC make use of several tools, protocols, and models that imitate certain traits of human tumors. Commonly used preclinical models in CRC research include cell line models, patient-derived xenografts, orthotopic xenografts, genetically engineered mouse models, organoid models, and spheroid models. Each model has its peculiar characteristics, strengths, and weaknesses so the choice of preclinical model for a study depends largely on the objectives and the answers being sought from the study. Preclinical studies into CRC show lots of promise and must be pursued along with refinement of the tools used in order to learn more about the disease and discover more effective treatment options
Going Beyond Counting First Authors in Author Co-citation Analysis
Get PDFThe present study examines one of the fundamental aspects of author co-citation analysis (ACA) - the way co-citation
counts are defined. Co-citation counting provides the data on which all subsequent statistical analyses and mappings
are based, and we compare ACA results based on two different types of co-citation counting - the traditional type that
only counts the first one among a cited work's authors on the one hand and a non-traditional type that takes into
account the first 5 authors of a cited work on the other hand. Results indicate that the picture produced through this non-traditional author co-citation counting contains more coherent author groups and is therefore considerably clearer. However, this picture represents fewer specialties in the research field being studied than that produced through the traditional first-author co-citation counting when the same number of top-ranked authors is selected and analyzed. Reasons for these effects are discussed
Nutraceuticals for maternal and offspring’s dental health
No full textEvidence shows that oral health status during pregnancy can influence gestational outcomes, maternal systemic health, and overall well-being. Both caries and periodontitis, the most common oral diseases, are preventable by optimal oral hygiene, and this should be promoted by private and public dental care services. However, no significant change in oral hygiene habits have been seen at population level in most developed countries and this brings a need for identifying other preventive measures, including other modifiable lifestyle factors, such as diet. The consumption of specific foods or minerals and vitamins has been associated with good oral and general health in the general population. It is plausible to assume that these foods, minerals, and vitamins would also have a beneficial effect during pregnancy. This chapter presents the available evidence on the effect of consumption of nutraceuticals for dental health during pregnancy
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