The incidence of osteoarthritis is ever increasing in recent years, even at the younger age of onset. Osteoarthritis is a kind of degenerative disease, due mainly to aging, obesity, strain, trauma, joint congenital abnormalities, and joint deformity caused by articular cartilage degradation injury, joint edge and subchondral bone reactive hyperplasia of osteojoint disease, also known as degenerative arthritis or senile arthritis. The main clinical manifestations of the disease are joint pain, tenderness, stiffness, joint swelling, limited mobility, muscle atrophy, and joint deformity. Joint discomfort often occurs in the load-bearing joints, such as knee, hip, spine, and finger joints. Among them, the knee is the most prone to discomfort, where the incidence of knee osteoarthritis is much higher than that of other joint inflammation in the body. Knee osteoarthritis is generally treated to relieve the pain for better joint mobility. Current treatments for knee osteoarthritis can be divided into three categories: non-drug, drug, and surgical treatment. Non-drug treatment includes psychological education, exercise promotion, weight loss, and joint protection. Drug treatment includes the use of non-opioid analgesics, topical analgesics, non-sterol anti-inflammatory drugs, narcotic analgesics, intra-articular injections of sterols, and hyaluronic acid. Surgical treatment includes joint debridement and joint replacement. Glucosamine and chondroitin sulfate supplements have been proven to be effective in the treatment of knee osteoarthritis for the less structural damage of articular cartilage in the different clinical trials. The present study aims to investigate the clinical efficacy of a tableted candy on knee osteoarthritis. The cartilage extract, turmeric, Pueraria lobata, and Coix seed powder were also taken as the main components. Clinic human feeding trials were performed on the visual analogue scale (VAS), Western Ontario, and McMaster University Osteoarthritis Index (WOMAC), clinical symptom score, serum interleukin-6 (IL-6) and high-sensitivity C reactive protein (hs-CRP) levels before and after the experiment between the experimental and the placebo group. The results showed that there was a significant decrease in the VAS score, pain WOMAC, joint stiffness, physiological function, and total score after eating the tableted candy samples in the experimental group, compared with the control ( P < 0.01). There was a significant decrease in the clinical symptom scores of joint pains, tenderness, morning stiffness time, swelling, and total score ( P < 0.01), even lower than those in the control group. Meanwhile, the effective rate (61.02%) was significantly higher than that in the control group (15.25%) ( P < 0.01). In addition, the level of IL-6 in the experimental group significantly decreased ( P < 0.05) during the test period, indicating no adverse reactions. No significant changes or abnormalities were observed in the safety indicators of all subjects. In conclusion, the tablet candy can be expected to relieve the pain and swelling of the knee joint, in order to improve the function and activity of the knee joint in the control of the disease. There was closely related to the regulation of inflammatory factor IL-6. Therefore, safe and effective health food can be expected to greatly improve knee osteoarthritis.

Ellagic acid (EA) could be converted into urolithins to exert health-promoting effects by intestinal flora, but the biotransformation capacity varied among individuals. Strategies targeted on gut microflora modulation could be a novel method to obtain more urolithins beyond the inter-individual variability. The study aimed at investigating the impacts of four algal polysaccharides (APs) supplements on EA biotransformation. Results showed that simple APs supplements would increase certain urolithin productions, and APs-EA solid dispersions supplement improved urolithins contents from 4.25 μmol to 6.16-6.79 μmol. The enhancement was related to the proliferation of the EA-metabolic-related bacteria like Gordonibacter, Faecalibacterium, Sutterella, Dialister, Enterocloster and etc. and increasing the bioaccessibility of EA to the bacteria. Furthermore, mono-/co-culture fermentation further verified that Gordonibacter urolithinfaciens was greatly proliferated by simple APs and EA solid dispersions supplements. EA/UPP 1-1 showed the best performances in urolithins productions, and the total urolithins contents increased by 3.78 times compared to control EA group. These results showed dietary supplements could improve biotransformation ability by influencing the EA-metabolic-related bacteria and the access to substrates. 

In the present study, a new type of selenium nanoparticles (SeNPs) was synthesized using oyster protein hydrolysates (OPH) as both a stabilizer and capping agent upon ultrasonication. OPH with alcohol dehydrogenase activation activity was prepared and used to fabricate OPH-SeNPs, where monodisperse SeNPs with a transparent orange appearance, ranging from 140 to 310 nm, were obtained. Physicochemical analysis further suggested a weak interaction between SeNPs and the –NH, C=O, COO–, and C–N groups of the OPH, and the formed nanocomposite with improved stability against aggregation was in an amorphous state. The hepatoprotective effect of OPH-SeNPs on HepG2 cells showed that pre-incubation with OPH-SeNPs significantly decreased cell apoptosis induced by hydrogen peroxide and could well maintain cell integrity. A reduction in intracellular reactive oxygen species was found, along with ameliorated activity of internal antioxidant enzymes. The observed upregulation of key antioxidant-related components, i.e., glutathione peroxidase, nuclear factor erythroid 2-related factor 2 (Nrf2), and heme oxygenase-1, suggests activation of the Nrf2-antioxidant response element signaling pathway, which mechanistically explains the hepatoprotective effect of OPH-SeNPs against hydrogen peroxide-induced cytotoxicity in HepG2 cells.

In our previous study, defatted walnut meal hydrolysate (DWMH) could attenuate D-galactose-induced acute memory deficits in vivo, and 6 potent active peptides including WSREEQ, WSREEQE, WSREEQEREE, ADIYTE, ADIYTEEAG and ADIYTEEAGR were identified. The aim of this study was to investigate the possible mechanism underlying their neuroprotective effects on glutamate-induced apoptosis in PC12 cells and their digestive stability. Results showed that all these peptides could attenuate the reduction of cell viability caused by glutamate in PC12 cells, especially WSREEQEREE and ADIYTEEAGR. The addition of Arg residue in WSREEQEREE and ADIYTEEAGR might be the potential reason for their stronger protective effects. Additionally, these two peptides possibly protected PC12 cells against glutamate-induced apoptosis via activating intracellular antioxidant defence (superoxide dismutase (SOD) and glutathione peroxidase (GSH-Px)) through Kelch-like ECH-associated protein 1 (Keap1) inhibition, inhibiting ROS production, Ca²⁺ influx and mitochondrial membrane potential (MMP) collapse as well as regulating the expression of apoptosis-related proteins (Bax and Bcl-2). This might be due to the presence of Trp, Tyr and Arg in these two peptides. However, encapsulation of WSREEQEREE and ADIYTEEAGR should be considered based on their digestive sensibility during in vitro gastrointestinal digestion.