Mohammad Serajuddin

Association of MTHFR (C677T) Gene Polymorphism With Breast Cancer in North India

Background Breast cancer is one of the most common malignancies in women and is associated with a variety of risk factors. The functional single-nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) C677T in the gene encoding 5,10-methylenetetrahydrofolate reductase (MTHFR) may lead to decreased enzyme activity and affect the chemosensitivity of tumor cells. This study was designed to investigate the association of MTHFR gene polymorphism (SNP) in the pathogenesis of breast cancer among the North Indian women population. Materials and Methods Genotyping was performed by polymerase chain reaction (PCR) using genomic DNA, extracted from the peripheral blood of subjects with (275 cases) or without (275 controls) breast cancer. Restriction fragment length polymorphism was used to study C677T polymorphism in the study groups. Results The distribution of MTHFR (C677T) genotype frequencies, ie, CC, TT, and CT, among the patients was 64.7%, 2.18%, and 33.09%, respectively. In the healthy control group, the CC, TT, and CT frequencies were 78.91%, 1.09%, and 20.1%, respectively. The frequencies of C and T alleles were 81.2% and 18.7%, respectively, in the patient subjects, while they were 88.9% and 11.09%, respectively, among the healthy control group. Frequencies of the CT genotype and the T allele were significantly different (P = 0.007 and P = 0.005, respectively) between the control and the case subjects. Conclusion This study shows an association of the CT genotype and the T allele of the MTHFR (C667T) gene with increased genetic risk for breast cancer among Indian women.

Evaluation of miR-711 as Novel Biomarker in Prostate Cancer Progression

Objective: MicroRNAs (miRs) are class of small non-coding regulatory RNA aberrantly expressed in various types of malignancies including prostate cancer and serves as potential targets to develop new diagnostic and therapeutic strategies. In this quiet we investigated miRNAs expression profile in benign prostatic hyperplasia (BPH) and prostate cancer (PCa) tissue samples and correlated their expression with clinicopathological parameters. Methodology: The miRNAs expression profile as well as their validation has been done by using Microarray and RT-PCR, respectively. Additionally, we also tried to speculate microRNA-mRNA regulatory module through computational target predictions by using Targetscan, Miranda and MirWalk and obtained results were analysed through DAVID software. Result: We observed that miR-711 is significantly deregulated in BPH and PCa, compared to controls. The lower expression of miR-711 was found to be significantly associated with high Gleason score and metastatic disease. Furthermore, the computational target prediction analysis explored miR-711 association to various cancer cells signalling cascade key molecules associated with cancer cell survival. Conclusion: From our observations we suggest that miR-711 may play a critical role in PCa progression, regulation of various cancer cell survival signalling cascades and that it may be a valuable biomarker for prediction of metastatic disease and poor prognosis in PCa.

Phenotypic Variation in Freshwater Murrel, Channa punctatus (Bloch, 1793) from Northern and Eastern Regions of India Using Truss Analysis

Morphometric variation study was carried out using truss analysis in freshwater murrel, Channa punctatus (Bloch, 1793), to explore different phenotypic stocks of C. punctatus. Significant variation in the morphometric analysis was observed using the truss network and multivariate analysis of the three subpopulations of freshwater murrel, C. punctatus, from the two different regions of India. Principal component analysis accounted for a total variation of 91.95% by the first three principal components. PC 1 represented the variation due to size and PC 2 and PC 3 represented variations due to shape. The 95% confidence ellipses depicted the clear isolation between the samples in scatter graph of PC 1 on PC 2. The combined groups plot (DF 1 on DF 2) based on discriminant function analysis (DFA) also validated the existence of three different subpopulations. In group classification using DFA, 100 percent of all the samples were correctly classified into their original subpopulation. These results support the existence of multiracial composition of C. punctatus across the different geographical isolated sites and, thus, these findings indicate the presence of three different phenotypic stocks of C. punctatus.

MicroRNA-183-5p: A New Potential Marker for Prostate Cancer

The microRNA (miR)-183-5p is expressed at high level in the majority of cancer. The purpose of present study was to investigate the role of oncogenic miR-183-5p in prostate cancer (PCa) as biomarker. We carried out our experiment in 50 prostate cancer patients and 40 patients of benign prostatic hyperplasia (BPH) and 40 adjacent controls tissue. The expression of miR-183-5p was evaluated through reverse transcription qualitative polymerase chain reaction. We found that the expression of miR-183-5p in PCa tissue was significantly up regulated as compared to BPH patients and adjacent normal tissues as control. Additionally, miR-183 expression was correlated with higher prostate-specific antigen, higher Gleason Score and metastatic condition. A receiver operating characteristic curve analysis revealed that miR-183-5p distinguished PCa patients from BPH patients and also from control. In conclusion, our data suggest that oncogenic miR-183-5p may be useful as a new tissue specific diagnostic biomarker in prostate cancer.

Reproductive biology of the freshwater murrel Channa punctatus (Bloch, 1793) from River Gomti of Lucknow region, Uttar Pradesh, India

A total of 187 samples of Channa punctatus (Bloch, 1793) from River Gomti of Lucknow region, Uttar Pradesh were studied during 2011. The sex ratio of 1: 0.84 was not significantly different from 1:1. Monthly variation in the gonadosomatic index (GSI) and maximum number of stage IV gonads encountered in the months of May to August indicated that the spawning season extends for about 4 months and spawning was high during the monsoon season. Absolute fecundity varied from 11000 to 28000, with an average value of 14920. Fecundity was found to be highly correlated to the total length (r = 0.9201), body weight (r = 0.9133) and weight of ovary (r = 0.8536) with all correlation coefficients being highly significant (p<0.0001). Total length (TL) of fish and weight of the ovary also highly correlated (r = 0.9551, p<0.0001). This study provides primary information on reproductive parameters of C. punctatus from River Gomti which can be utilised for management of the resource.

Length-weight relationship and condition factor of five sub-populations of Trichogaster lalius (Osphronemidae) of central and eastern regions of India

Length-weight relationship along with condition factor was studied in five sub-populations of Trichogaster lalius collected from five different habitats of central and eastern parts of India characterized by different environmental conditions. Results of the current length-weight relationship study show that there is significant difference from the isometric b (3.0) value in the sub-populations of Lucknow Pond, River Gomti and Kolkata Pond, whereas there is no significant difference in the Malihabad and Barabanki sub-populations. This clearly indicates the negative allometric (b < 3) growth in the specimens collected from Lucknow, River Gomti and Kolkata and these sub-populations do not follow the cube law strictly. A positive straight line correlation was found between length and weight as the values of coefficient of correlation (r) of all the subpopulations of T. lalius varied between 0.92–0.97. The values obtained from covariance analysis for the difference between slopes of regression line for the sub-populations suggested that separate equations are required for five sub-populations of T. lalius. The Fulton’s condition factor (K) was used to evaluate the condition or fatness of fish which showed that the growth in all the sub-populations of T. lalius is satisfactory.