Project description:Knee osteoarthritis (KOA), as a degenerative multifactorial disease, affects the quality of life and mental health of patients, and also brings a huge socioeconomic burden. Treating synovitis have shown promise as anti-inflammatory therapeutics in mitigating OA symptoms and disease progression. Here, by analysing synovial single-cell sequencing (scRNA-seq) data from KOA, we found that synovial fibroblasts (FLS) in OA synovium showed a distinct pro-inflammatory phenotype. We collected synovial tissue from patients with clinical OA as well as from healthy donors, and histological examination was consistent with findings in scRNA-seq. Inspired by recent cross-tissue fibroblast lineage studies, we identified by sequencing that healthy FLS in synovial tissues share transcriptome-level similarities with dermal fibroblasts (DFb). Subsequently, we revealed the local as well as systemic distribution of intra-articular injected DFbs by constructing/extracting two types of rat fibroblasts (luciferase DFbs as well as GFP DFbs). The results demonstrate that DFbs can be locally retained in the synovium for up to three weeks following targeted engrafting on it. And intra-articular injection does not result in DFbs migration to vital organs or the occurrence of histological changes in these organs. A rat model of KOA was constructed by anterior cruciate ligament transection (ACLT) in order to study the therapeutic effect of DFbs on KOA. After injection, the rats showed improvement in painful gait. In addition, histological as well as imaging results showed reduced synovitis and improvement in articular cartilage. Finally we verified the protective effect of DFbs on cytokine-stimulated chondrocytes in a co-culture system.
Project description:Stroke remains a major global health challenge due to its high mortality and significant socioeconomic burden. Despite advances in clinical management, effective diagnostic tools and therapeutic strategies remain limited. This study aimed to identify and expand the repertoire of biomarkers of damage and repair that could serve as potential diagnostic and prognostic tools across post-stroke phases. Twenty-three male wild-type mice were assigned to control pre-stroke, 24-hour acute, and 35-day chronic post-stroke groups. Cerebral ischemic injury was induced via a 30-minute middle cerebral artery occlusion Koizumi method. Magnetic resonance imaging and neurological scoring were used to assess lesion size and functional deficit acutely, as well as structural and functional changes during the chronic phase. Proteomic profiling of the ipsilateral and contralateral cortices was performed using by data-independent acquisition (DIA)-based MS method. Seventy-four proteins showed significant alterations and were classified into four temporal expression clusters: acutely and chronically upregulated, acutely upregulated and chronically downregulated, acutely downregulated and chronically upregulated, and acutely and chronically downregulated. Gene ontology analysis identified 47 affected biological processes, including synaptic signaling, immune response, cell-cell communication, cytoskeletal organization, and proliferation. Several proteins not previously associated with stroke pathophysiology were identified, including 10 from the ipsilateral cortex (Dbi, Cpne3, Dnm2, Eef1a1, Taldo1, Pgls, Gnb5, Phf24, Ctsz, Capg) and 3 from the contralateral cortex (Agpat3, Cacng8, Endod). These findings provide novel molecular insights into post-stroke energy metabolism, neuroinflammation, and cellular remodeling, highlighting potential targets for further intervention.
Project description:Male Sprague-Dawley rats were used to establish exhausted-exercise model by motorized rodent treadmill. Yu-Ping-Feng-San at doses of 2.18 g/kg was administrated by gavage before exercise training for 10 consecutive days. Quantitative proteomics was performed for assessing the related mechanism of Yu-Ping-Feng-San.