The Effect of Terpenoid Natural Chinese Medicine Molecular Compound on Lung Cancer Treatment

The Most Potent Natural Pharmaceuticals, Cosmetics, and Food Ingredients Isolated from Plants with Deep Eutectic Solvents

There is growing interest in reducing the number of synthetic products or additives and replacing them with natural ones. The pharmaceutical, cosmetic, and food industries are especially focused on natural and bioactive chemicals isolated from plants or microorganisms. The main challenge here is to develop efficient and ecological methods for their isolation. According to the strategies and rules of sustainable development and green chemistry, green solvents and environmentally friendly technologies must be used. The application of deep eutectic solvents as efficient and biodegradable solvents seems to be a promising alternative to traditional methods. They are classified as being green and ecological but, most importantly, very efficient extraction media compared to organic solvents. The aim of this review is to present the recent findings on green extraction, as well as the biological activities and the possible applications of natural plant ingredients, namely, phenolics, flavonoids, terpenes, saponins, and some others. This paper thoroughly reviews modern, ecological, and efficient extraction methods with the use of deep eutectic solvents (DESs). The newest findings, as well as the factors influencing the efficiency of extraction, such as water content, and hydrogen bond donor and acceptor types, as well as the extraction systems, are also discussed. New solutions to the major problem of separating DESs from the extract and for solvent recycling are also presented.

Costs of traditional Chinese medicine treatment for inpatients with lung cancer in China: a national study

BACKGROUND

Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) has long been a widely recognized medical approach and has been covered by China's basic medical insurance schemes to treat lung cancer. But there was a lack of nationwide research to illustrate the impact of the use of TCM on lung cancer patients' economic burden in mainland China. Therefore, we conduct a nationwide study to reveal whether the use of TCM could increase or decrease the medical expenditure of lung cancer inpatients in mainland China.

METHODS

This is a 7-year cross-sectional study from 2010 to 2016. The data is a random sample of 5% from lung cancer claims data records of Chinese Urban Employee Basic Medical Insurance (UEBMI) and Urban Resident Basic Medical Insurance (URBMI). Mann-Whitney test was used to compare inpatient cost data with positive skewness. Ordinary least squares regression analysis was performed to compare the total TCM users' hospitalization cost with TCM nonusers', to examine whether TCM use is the key factor inducing relatively high medical expenditure.

RESULT

A total of 47,393 lung cancer inpatients were included in this study, with 38,697 (81.7%) of them at least using one kind of TCM approach. The per inpatient medical cost of TCM users was RMB18,798 (USD2,830), which was 65.2% significantly higher than that of TCM nonusers (P < 0.001). The medication cost, conventional medication cost, and nonpharmacy cost of TCM users were all higher than TCM nonusers, illustrating the higher medical cost of TCM users was not induced by TCM only. With confounding factors fixed, there was a positive correlation between TCM cost and conventional medication cost, nonpharmacy cost (Coef. = 0.283 and 0.211, all P < 0.001), indicting synchronous increase of TCM costs and conventional medication cost for TCM users.

CONCLUSION

The use of TCM could not offset the utilization of conventional medicine, demonstrating TCM mainly played a complementary role but not an alternative role in the inpatient treatment of lung cancer. A joint Clinical Guideline that could balance the use of TCM and Conventional medicine should be developed for the purpose of reducing economic burden for lung cancer inpatients.

Non-invasive optical monitoring of human lungs: Monte Carlo modeling of photon migration in Visible Chinese Human and an experimental test on a human

The human lung was quantified and visualized by photon transport in this paper. A Monte Carlo (MC) simulation of voxelized media was used with the visible Chinese human (VCH). This study theoretically explored the feasibility of non-invasive optical detection of pulmonary hemodynamics, and investigated the optimal location of the light source in the lung photon migration and optimized the source-detector distance. The light fluence intensity showed that the photon penetration depth was 6-8.4 mm in the human lung. The optimal distance from the light source to the detector was 2.7-2.9 cm, but the optimal distance of the superior lobe of right lung was 3.3-3.5 cm. We then conducted experiments on diffuse light reflectance using NIRS on 14 volunteers. These measurements agree well with the simulation results. All the results demonstrated the great potential of non-invasive monitoring of pulmonary hemodynamics and contribute to the study of human lungs in the biomedical optics community.

Mechanism of enhanced production of triterpenoids in algal-fungal consortium

Chlorella pyrenoidosa-Ganoderma lucidum symbiotic systems were constructed. The mechanism of enhanced production of triterpenoids in algal-fungal consortium by comparing the contents of triterpenoids in individual fungal systems and algal-fungal consortium systems was investigated. The production of triterpenoids in C. pyrenoidosa-G. lucidum consortium increased significantly (P < 0.05). The categories and relative abundances of metabolites in the individual systems and algal-fungal systems were measured and analyzed by metabonomic tests. There were 57 significant different metabolites (VIP > 1 and P < 0.05) including 12 downregulated metabolites and 45 upregulated metabolites were obtained. The significant enriched metabolic pathways (VIP > 1 and P < 0.05) of citrate cycle (TCA cycle), tyrosine metabolism, glycolysis, and terpenoid backbone biosynthesis in algal-fungal consortium were obtained. The relative abundances of important precursors of triterpenoids including mevalonic acid, lanosterol, and hydroquinone were 1.4 times, 1.7 times, and 2 times, respectively, in algal-fungal consortium than that in the individual fungal systems. The presence of C. pyrenoidosa in algal-fungal consortium promoted the biosynthesis of triterpenoids in G. lucidum.