Hyperlipidemia is a frequent metabolic disorder that is closely associated with diet.  It is believed that brown rice, containing the outer bran layer and germ, is beneficial for the remission of hyperlipidemia.  This study established a rat model of hyperlipidemia by feeding a high-fat diet.  The hypolipidemic potential of germinated brown rice (Gbrown) and germinated black rice (a germinated black-pigmented brown rice, Gblack) were explored in the model rats, mainly in the aspects of blood lipids, lipases, apolipoproteins, and inflammation.  The gut microbiota in hyperlipidemic rats receiving diverse dietary interventions was determined by 16S rDNA sequencing.  The results showed that the intervention of Gbrown/Gblack alleviated the hyperlipidemia in rats, evidenced by decreased TC, TG, LDL-C, and apolipoprotein B, and increased HDL-C, HL, LPL, LCAT, and apolipoprotein A1.  Gbrown/Gblack also weakened the inflammation in hyperlipidemia rats, evidenced by decreased TNF-α, IL-6, and ET-1.  In addition, 16S rDNA sequencing revealed that the diet of Gbrown/Gblack elevated the abundance and diversity of gut microbiota in hyperlipidemia rats.  At the phylum level, Gbrown/Gblack decreased Firmicutes, increased Bacteroidetes, and decreased the F/B ratio in hyperlipidemia rats.  At the genus level, Gbrown/Gblack decreased Streptococcus and increased Ruminococcus and Allobaculum in hyperlipidemia rats.  Some differential microbial genera relating to lipid metabolism were also determined, such as the Lachnospira and Ruminococcus in the Gblack group, and the Phascolarctobacterium, Dorea, Turicibacter, and Escherichia-Shigella in the Gbrown group.  Notably, the beneficial effect of Gblack was stronger than Gbrown.  To sum up, the dietary interventions of Gbrown/Gblack contributed to the remission of hyperlipidemia by alleviating the dysbiosis of gut microbiota.

Chronic diseases have drawn much attention as the primary cause of death and disability.  In exploring novel side-effect-free agents against chronic diseases, significant efforts have been devoted to mushroom polysaccharides due to their diverse biological activities.  This work reviewed the structural features, biological performances and molecular mechanisms of mushroom polysaccharides in managing cancers, diabetes mellitus and cardiovascular diseases.  The potentials of mushroom polysaccharides against chronic diseases highly depend on their structural features, including monosaccharide composition, molecular weight, the type and configuration of glycosidic bonds, degree of branching, the type of substituent pattern and chain conformation.  Regarding their working mechanisms, shared and disease-specific pathways were found.  The three chronic diseases shared the regulation of specific signalling pathways and the adjustment of gut microbiota.  In addition, the roles of transcription factors, receptors, enzymes, hormones and other functional proteins involved in the molecular mechanisms of mushroom polysaccharides against chronic diseases are first elaborated herein.  The present review describes the state of the art of mushroom polysaccharides in treating chronic diseases and addresses the perspectives, and will further promote research on this topic.

Mesenchymal stem cells (MSCs) derived from bone marrow are a well-characterized population of adult stem cells that can be maintained and propagated in culture for a long time with the capacity to form a variety of cell types. This study investigated the characteristics of dairy goat bone marrow MSCs (gMSCs) and their differentiation potential toward germ cells in vitro, and to test their potential in vivo, these cells were transplanted into seminiferous tubes of endogenous germ cells-depleted mouse models. The results showed that characteristic gMSC lines were established and a small population of gMSCs transdifferentiated into male germ cell-like cells which expressed Stra8 after induction with retinoic acid (RA), as analysed by reverse transcription-polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) and immunofluorescence. Further, we transplanted the gMSCs into endogenous germ cells-depleted mouse models. A variety of analysis demonstrated that gMSCs might differentiate into male germ cells and helped spermatogenesis in endogenous germ cells depleted mouse models at 30 d after transplantation. The gMSCs could be used as a potential source of cells for reproductive studies and a neoadjuvant therapy for the spermatogenesis anomaly. Moreover, these cells may offer a new strategy for male infertility and an alternative approach for production of transgenic animals.

Since May 2006, a highly pathogenic porcine reproductive and respiratory syndrome virus (HP-PRRSV) variant characterizedby 30 amino acids deletion within its NSP2-coding region emerged and caused extensive economic losses to China’s pigindustry. To investigate the in vivo pathogenicity and immune responses of the newly emerging PRRSV, 3 groups of 60-d-old conventional piglets were inoculated intranasally with a representative strain of the HP-PRRSV variant HuN4 with3 different infection doses (3×103-3×105 TCID50). The results revealed that the virus variant caused severe disease inpiglets and the significant clinical characteristics consisted of persistently high fever (41.0-41.9ºC) and high morbidity andmortality (60-100%), the marked clinical signs of PRRS and severe histopathogenic damages in multiple organs. It inducedrapid and intense humoral immune responses and seroconversion was detected in most infected pigs at 7 d post-infection(DPI). The virus vigorously replicated in vivo and the highest virus average titer was 9.7 log copies mL-1 serum at 7 DPI.Elevated levels of IFN-γ and IL-10 cytokine production in serum in this study were also observed. Taken together, ourresults demonstrated that the HP-PRRSV variant HuN4 strain is highly pathogenic for piglets and suitable to be a referencestrain of highly virulent PRRSV for evaluating the efficacy of the new vaccines.