Erdal Sanlidag

Objective: As an alternative to RT-qPCR assays used in the diagnosis SARS-CoV-2, antigen-detecting rapid diagnostic tests (Ag-RDTs) are available for the qualitative detection of SARS-CoV-2 in nasopharyngeal swab samples. The aim of this study was to assess the accuracy and reliability of Ag-RDTs as a diagnostic method of detecting SARS-CoV-2 positive cases within a given population. Methods: In first phase of this investigation, 357 nasopharyngeal swab samples were screened for SARS-CoV-2 using Ag-RDTs. For the purposes of this study RT-qPCR was then applied to the same 357 nasopharyngeal swab samples in order to compare the reliability of the two detection methods. In the second phase of this investigation, Ag-RDTs were applied to an additional 75 nasopharyngeal swab samples that were already known to be RT-qPCR positive. Results: In the first phase of this investigation, of the 357 samples screened using Ag-RDTs 14 samples were positive for SARS-CoV-2, in contrast, when RT-qPCR analysis was applied to the same 357 samples no SARS-CoV-2 samples were detected. Therefore, the false antigen positivity was determined to be at 3.9%. In the second phase of this investigation 75 RT-qPCR positive samples were re-evaluated with a rapid antigen test. Twenty-four of the 75 RT-qPCR positive sample were undetected. Conclusion: Solely relying on rapid antigen tests to detect SARS-CoV-2 infections in the community could consequently result in infectious individuals remaining in the population. The impact of false negative rapid test results can be reduced by implementing confirmatory RT-qPCR analysis particularly in symptomatic patients.

Amongst all cancer types, liver cancer is the fourth leading cause of cancer mortality. It is frequently stated as hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) and occurs in hepatocytes. Genetic alterations of hepatocytes such as Wnt/β-catenin and JAK / STAT signaling pathways play a key role for the development of the HCC. Currently, there are a few available treatments for HCC; such treatments include transplantation, surgical resections and anticancer drugs. Most of the anti-cancer drugs target the signaling pathways for achieving an effective treatment. However, these treatments have some undesirable side effects. Thus, there is a need for discovering alternative anti-cancer agents with no or lesser side effects. Plant constituents are promising anti-cancer agents. Cynara cornigera L. contains plenty of phenolic compounds including quercetin, apigenin, etc. This study aimed to analyze the anti-cancer property of the fractionated methanol extract of the flowers of C. cornigera. All the fractions obtained were analyzed to determine the cytotoxic activity on HepG2 cells. Two of the fractions containing polyphenolic compounds had a significant cytotoxic activity related to non-canonical Wnt11 signaling pathways on HepG2 cells.