Role of amino acids in rheumatoid arthritis studied by metabolomics

Background. Rheumatoid arthritis (RA) is a complex, chronic autoimmune disease characterized by various inflammatory symptoms, including joint swelling, joint pain, and both structural and functional joint damage. The most commonly used animal model for studying RA is mice with collagen‐induced arthritis (CIA); the wide use of this model is due...

Characterization of the therapeutic properties of Chinese herbal materials by measuring delayed luminescence and dendritic cell-based immunomodulatory response

Based on the traditional Chinese medicine theory, the Chinese pharmacopeia assigns a therapeutic description of “taste” to all herbs; thus, an herb's “taste” is valued in traditional Chinese medicine as a major ethnopharmacological category and reflects the herb's therapeutic properties. These properties guide the practitioner with respect to...

Measuring ultra-weak photon emission as a non-invasive diagnostic tool for detecting early-stage type 2 diabetes: A step toward personalized medicine

The global prevalence of type 2 diabetes is estimated to reach 4.4% by 2030, placing a significant burden on our healthcare system. Therefore, the ability to identify patients in early stages of the disease is essential for both prevention and effective management, and diagnostic methods based on traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) may be...

Spontaneous ultra-weak photon emission in correlation to inflammatory metabolism and oxidative stress in a mouse model of collagen-induced arthritis

The increasing prevalence of rheumatoid arthritis has driven the development of new approaches and technologies for investigating the pathophysiology of this devastating, chronic disease. From the perspective of systems biology, combining comprehensive personal data such as metabolomics profiling with ultra-weak photon emission (UPE) data may...

Tracking biochemical changes correlated with ultra-weak photon emission using metabolomics

Ultra-weak photon emission (UPE) is light emitted spontaneously by biological systems without the use of specific luminescent complexes. UPE is emitted in the near-UV/UV–Vis/near-IR spectra during oxidative metabolic reactions; however, the specific pathways involved in UPE remain poorly understood. Here, we used HL-60 cells, a human...

Effects of growth altitude on chemical constituents and delayed luminescence properties in medicinal rhubarb

To improve the quality control of herbal drugs, there has been a major shift from evaluating individual chemicals to evaluating multiple-constituent chemicals, given the multi-pharmacology nature of herbal drugs. Therefore, rapid, systematic assays are needed in order to assess the quality of medicinal herbs using a comprehensive, integrated...

Differences between serum polar lipid profiles of male and female rheumatoid arthritis patients in response to glucocorticoid treatment

Objective As there are pharmacological differences between males and females, and glucocorticoid (GC) treatment is associated with increased cardiovascular mortality rate in rheumatoid arthritis (RA) patients, it is important to study serum polar lipid profiles of male and female patients in response to GC therapy. Gender differences may require...

Exploring the inflammatory metabolomic profile to predict response to TNF-alpha inhibitors in rheumatoid arthritis

In clinical practice, approximately one-Third of patients with rheumatoid arthritis(RA) respond insufficiently to TNF-alpha inhibitors (TNFis). The aim of the study was to explore the use of a metabolomics to identify predictors for the outcome of TNFi therapy, and study the metabolomic fingerprint in active RA irrespective of patients' response...