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Authors are the souls of any journal, and deserve much respect. To publish a journal manuscripts are needed from authors. Authors have a great responsibility for producing facts of their work in terms of number and results truthfully and an individual honesty is expected from authors in this regards. Both ways its true "No authors-No manuscripts-No journals" and "No journals–No manuscripts–No authors". Reviewing a manuscript is also a very responsible and important task of any peer-reviewed journal and to be taken seriously. It needs knowledge on the subject, sincerity, honesty and determination. Although the process of reviewing a manuscript is a time consuming task butit is expected to give one's best remarks within the time frame of the journal.
Salient features of the JCDR: It is a biomedical, multidisciplinary (including all medical and dental specialities), e-journal, with wide scope and extensive author support. At the same time, a free text of manuscript is available in HTML and PDF format. There is fast growing authorship and readership with JCDR as this can be judged by the number of articles published in it i e; in Feb 2007 of its first issue, it contained 5 articles only, and now in its recent volume published in April 2011, it contained 67 manuscripts. This e-journal is fulfilling the commitments and objectives sincerely, (as stated by Editor-in-chief in his preface to first edition) i e; to encourage physicians through the internet, especially from the developing countries who witness a spectrum of disease and acquire a wealth of knowledge to publish their experiences to benefit the medical community in patients care. I also feel that many of us have work of substance, newer ideas, adequate clinical materials but poor in medical writing and hesitation to submit the work and need help. JCDR provides authors help in this regards.
Timely publication of journal: Publication of manuscripts and bringing out the issue in time is one of the positive aspects of JCDR and is possible with strong support team in terms of peer reviewers, proof reading, language check, computer operators, etc. This is one of the great reasons for authors to submit their work with JCDR. Another best part of JCDR is "Online first Publications" facilities available for the authors. This facility not only provides the prompt publications of the manuscripts but at the same time also early availability of the manuscripts for the readers.
Indexation and online availability: Indexation transforms the journal in some sense from its local ownership to the worldwide professional community and to the public.JCDR is indexed with Embase & EMbiology, Google Scholar, Index Copernicus, Chemical Abstracts Service, Journal seek Database, Indian Science Abstracts, to name few of them. Manuscriptspublished in JCDR are available on major search engines ie; google, yahoo, msn.
In the era of fast growing newer technologies, and in computer and internet friendly environment the manuscripts preparation, submission, review, revision, etc and all can be done and checked with a click from all corer of the world, at any time. Of course there is always a scope for improvement in every field and none is perfect. To progress, one needs to identify the areas of one's weakness and to strengthen them.
It is well said that "happy beginning is half done" and it fits perfectly with JCDR. It has grown considerably and I feel it has already grown up from its infancy to adolescence, achieving the status of standard online e-journal form Indian continent since its inception in Feb 2007. This had been made possible due to the efforts and the hard work put in it. The way the JCDR is improving with every new volume, with good quality original manuscripts, makes it a quality journal for readers. I must thank and congratulate Dr Hemant Jain, Editor-in-Chief JCDR and his team for their sincere efforts, dedication, and determination for making JCDR a fast growing journal.
Every one of us: authors, reviewers, editors, and publisher are responsible for enhancing the stature of the journal. I wish for a great success for JCDR."
Thanking you
With sincere regards
Dr. Rajendra Kumar Ghritlaharey, M.S., M. Ch., FAIS
Associate Professor,
Department of Paediatric Surgery, Gandhi Medical College & Associated
Kamla Nehru & Hamidia Hospitals Bhopal, Madhya Pradesh 462 001 (India)
E-mail: drrajendrak1@rediffmail.com
On May 11,2011
Dr. Shankar P.R.
"On looking back through my Gmail archives after being requested by the journal to write a short editorial about my experiences of publishing with the Journal of Clinical and Diagnostic Research (JCDR), I came across an e-mail from Dr. Hemant Jain, Editor, in March 2007, which introduced the new electronic journal. The main features of the journal which were outlined in the e-mail were extensive author support, cash rewards, the peer review process, and other salient features of the journal.
Over a span of over four years, we (I and my colleagues) have published around 25 articles in the journal. In this editorial, I plan to briefly discuss my experiences of publishing with JCDR and the strengths of the journal and to finally address the areas for improvement.
My experiences of publishing with JCDR: Overall, my experiences of publishing withJCDR have been positive. The best point about the journal is that it responds to queries from the author. This may seem to be simple and not too much to ask for, but unfortunately, many journals in the subcontinent and from many developing countries do not respond or they respond with a long delay to the queries from the authors 1. The reasons could be many, including lack of optimal secretarial and other support. Another problem with many journals is the slowness of the review process. Editorial processing and peer review can take anywhere between a year to two years with some journals. Also, some journals do not keep the contributors informed about the progress of the review process. Due to the long review process, the articles can lose their relevance and topicality. A major benefit with JCDR is the timeliness and promptness of its response. In Dr Jain's e-mail which was sent to me in 2007, before the introduction of the Pre-publishing system, he had stated that he had received my submission and that he would get back to me within seven days and he did!
Most of the manuscripts are published within 3 to 4 months of their submission if they are found to be suitable after the review process. JCDR is published bimonthly and the accepted articles were usually published in the next issue. Recently, due to the increased volume of the submissions, the review process has become slower and it ?? Section can take from 4 to 6 months for the articles to be reviewed. The journal has an extensive author support system and it has recently introduced a paid expedited review process. The journal also mentions the average time for processing the manuscript under different submission systems - regular submission and expedited review.
Strengths of the journal: The journal has an online first facility in which the accepted manuscripts may be published on the website before being included in a regular issue of the journal. This cuts down the time between their acceptance and the publication. The journal is indexed in many databases, though not in PubMed. The editorial board should now take steps to index the journal in PubMed. The journal has a system of notifying readers through e-mail when a new issue is released. Also, the articles are available in both the HTML and the PDF formats. I especially like the new and colorful page format of the journal. Also, the access statistics of the articles are available. The prepublication and the manuscript tracking system are also helpful for the authors.
Areas for improvement: In certain cases, I felt that the peer review process of the manuscripts was not up to international standards and that it should be strengthened. Also, the number of manuscripts in an issue is high and it may be difficult for readers to go through all of them. The journal can consider tightening of the peer review process and increasing the quality standards for the acceptance of the manuscripts. I faced occasional problems with the online manuscript submission (Pre-publishing) system, which have to be addressed.
Overall, the publishing process with JCDR has been smooth, quick and relatively hassle free and I can recommend other authors to consider the journal as an outlet for their work."
Dr. P. Ravi Shankar
KIST Medical College, P.O. Box 14142, Kathmandu, Nepal.
E-mail: ravi.dr.shankar@gmail.com
On April 2011 Anuradha
Dear team JCDR, I would like to thank you for the very professional and polite service provided by everyone at JCDR. While i have been in the field of writing and editing for sometime, this has been my first attempt in publishing a scientific paper.Thank you for hand-holding me through the process.
Dr. Anuradha
E-mail: anuradha2nittur@gmail.com
On Jan 2020
Original article / research
Full Version
Significance of the Glutathione-STransferase Activity and the Total Thiols Status in Chronic Alcoholics
Correspondence Address :
Ms. Mamta Singh, Sr. Lecturer, Biochemistry
PDM Dental College and Research Institute
Bahadurgarh-124507, Jajjhar, Haryana.
Phone: 09991100739
E-mail: mamta.gv@gamil.com; itsmamtabiochem@gmail.com
Objectives: The present study was conducted to assess the activity of glutathione -S-transferase (GST) and its relationship with total thiols (T-SH) in patients with alcohol liver disease (ALD).
Methods: Twenty male chronic alcoholics who had a history of alcohol abuse for more than five years were included in the present study and twenty healthy male volunteers who matched in age and socio-economic status, served as the controls. The plasma GST activity and the T-SH concentration were assayed.
Results: The activity of plasma GST was significantly higher in the chronic alcoholics as compared to that in the healthy controls. There was a significant decrease in the T-SH concentration and an increase in the aminotransferase (AST and ALT) and alkaline phosphatase (ALP) activities. Moreover, there was a significant negative correlation of the GST activity with the T-SH concentration (r = 0.45; p< 0.001).
Conclusions: The findings of the present study indicated that GST was a sensitive marker in the diagnosis of ALD. A significantly low concentration of T-SH was observed in the alcoholics as compared to that in the controls. Both these parameters (plasma GST activity and total thiols) showed a significantly negative correlation, indicating that there was an increase in the activity of GST with a decrease in the concentration of T-SH.
Alcohol Liver Disease, Glutathione-S-transferase (GST), Thiols, Biochemistry
INTRODUCTION
The liver is the primary organ for alcohol metabolism and thus, it is an especially vulnerable organ to alcohol-related injury. Now- adays the alcohol liver disease is a major cause of morbidity and mortality in India (1). The amount and the type of alcohol which is ingested is the most important risk factor for the development of alcohol liver disease (ALD). The chronic consumption of alcohol causes fatty acid accumulation in the hepatocytes and it decreases their functional capacity. The alcohol induced formation of free radicals and the oxidative damage in alcoholism have been proved by several authors by measuring various oxidants and antioxidants in the body fluids (2), (3). The involvement of free radical mechanism in the pathophysiology of ALD is demonstrated by lipid peroxidation markers in the liver, in the serum of patients with alcoholism and in alcohol fed rodents (2). Hepatocytes synthesize albumin, which is a major plasma protein. The total thiol (T-SH) groups which are present on the plasma proteins, particularly on albumin, are considered to be major anti-oxidants in vivo (4). The levels of protein -SH in the body indicate the antioxidant status and low levels of protein -SH have been shown to correlate with lipid hydroperoxides (5) and advanced oxidation protein productions (AOPP) (4). Glutathione-S-transferases (GSH-s-trans; EC 2.5.1.18) are a family of enzymes which are present in the cytosol of most of the cells which play an important role in the process of the detoxification of a number of potentially harmful electrophilic compounds by conjugating them to glutathione. In addition to this, GST also shows glutathione peroxidase activity (6) and it is known for the detoxification of hydrogen peroxide (H2O2).The activity of GST can be induced by several chemicals/ drugs, alcohol being one of them. GST-alpha is found specifically at high concentrations in the human liver. It is released quickly in large quantities into the blood Original Article Biochemistry Section during hepatocellular damage. Because of the half-life of GST alpha in plasma is ~1hr, its concentration will follow the changes in the hepatocellular damage more rapidlythan aspartate amino transferase (AST) or alanine amino transferase (ALT) which have plasma half lives of ~17 hours and ~47 hours respectively (7). Keeping the above facts in view, the current study was designed to investigate a) the levels of T-SH, b) the activity of GST in plasma and c) the relationship between T-SH and GST in alcohol abusers at the time of admission and in non-alcoholic healthy volunteers.
The study was conducted on twenty chronic alcohol abusers and twenty non-alcoholic healthy volunteers in the Department of Biochemistry, in collaboration with the Department of Medicine, PGIMS, Rohtak (Haryana). The study group comprised of male patients of alcoholic liver disease who had a history of alcohol intake for more than five years, with a continued daily intake of 80-160 gm of alcohol. Patients who were suffering from jaundice, cirrhosis and chronic liver disease due to alcohol intake were only included in the study and others were excluded from it. The study was approved by the local ethical committee and before their participation, the patients and volunteers were fully informed about the nature and the purpose of the study. A written consent was obtained from each of them. The patients were subjected to a detailed clinical examination and laboratory investigations. Liver function tests such as total and conjugated bilirubin, total protein and albumin levels, along with the enzymes (AST and ALT) were evaluated by using standard methods. Under aseptic conditions, blood samples were drawn into heparnized vacutainers which were free of iron contamination, from the antecubital veins of the patients and the healthy volunteers. The plasma was immediately separated by centrifuging the samples at 1000 rpm for 15 minutes. The activity of plasma GST was estimated by the method of Habig et al (1974) (8). The plasma total thiols (T-SH) were estimated according to the method which was described by Ellman (1959) (9). All the reagents and the chemicals which were used in this study were obtained from Sigma Chemicals Co. USA.
STATISTICAL ANALYSIS
The results were expressed as mean ± SEM. A P value of <0.05 was considered to be statistically significant. The Student’s independent ‘t’-test was used to test whether the differences between the subject groups of the patients and the healthy individuals were significant. Linear regression analysis was used to obtain the correlation coefficient between GST and T-SH.
The (Table/Fig 1) shows the results of the present study. There was a significant increase in the activities of plasma AST, ALT, ALP and GST in the chronic alcoholics as compared to those in the healthy controls (p<0.001). The plasma total thiol levels were found to be significantly lower in the alcoholics as compared to those in the healthy controls (p<0.001). We observed that plasma GST correlated positively with serum AST and serum ALT (p<0.001) and negatively with serum total thiols (p<0.001). Moreover, the AST/ALT ratio was significantly increased in chronic alcoholics as compared to that in the controls (p<0.001).The levels of the total plasma proteins and albumin were significantly lower in patients with ALD as compared to those in the healthy controls (p<0.001).
Free radical mediated damage to macro-molecules plays a crucial role in the patho-physiology of a wide variety of diseases including atherosclerosis, inflammation, carcinogenesis, ageing, drug reaction and toxicity (10). Liver injuries due to acute or chronic alcohol abuse have been proved to be dependent on its oxidative metabolism at the cytosolic, peroxisomal and /or the microsomal levels. It is not ethanol itself, but rather its metabolic products such as acetaldehyde and the reactive oxygen species (ROS), that account for the various functional derangements which accompany alcohol abuse (11). The induction of cytochrome P450 2E1(CYP450 2E1) by ethanol leads to an increased generation of ROS, leading to the development of oxidative stress (12). This is also potentiated by the redox shift which is associated with ethanol oxidation by alcohol dehydrogenase (13). Acetaldehyde dehydrogenase is enhanced due to the inactivation of the anti-oxidants (14).These facts suggest that oxidative stress may be one of the contributing factors in the pathogenesis of ALD. Elevated levels of alanine transaminase (ALT) and aspartate transaminase (AST) are regarded as indicators of liver damage and the isolated elevation of AST than ALT (with the AST/ALT ratio being >2) strongly suggests alcoholic liver disease (15). Thus, the plasma levels of these enzymes have been routinely checked to assess the liver function. In our study, there was a significant increase (p<0.001) in the AST, ALT and the ALP levels in chronic alcoholics as compared to those in the healthy controls. This indicated the presence of alcohol-induced hepatocyte damage in chronic alcoholics. The ratio of AST/ALT in alcoholics as compared to the normal healthy controls was found to be significantly elevated. Moreover, the increase in unconjugated bilirubin in alcoholics also supported the fact that their liver functions are deranged. Thederangement of the liver function tests suggested the damage of the hepatocytes. Glutathione-S-transferase (GST), is involved in the binding, transport and detoxification of a wide variety of endogenous and exogenous toxic compounds. Moreover, it is an important ancillary enzyme of the anti-oxidant defence system. Ethanol is known as an inducer of the GST activity in the hepatocytes and the determination of this enzyme in humans has been suggested as a useful monitor of cellular induction (16). We also have found significantly raised levels of GST in the chronic alcoholic patients. This could be due to the release of GST from the hepatocytes into the circulation following hepatic damage by oxidative stress, which was produced due to the generation of ROS during alcohol metabolism. It may indicate the active consumption of reduced thiols from the total thiol pool due to the increased GST activity in chronic alcoholics. It has been well established that GST is primarily involved in the cellular detoxification processes and that the elevated, circulating GST activity is considered to be an early index of the increased load on the hepatocytes in detoxifying toxins. It is related to indicate increased presence of oxidative stress. Thiol groups are found in all the body cells and they are indispensable for life (17),(18). Thiols are extra-ordinarily efficient anti-oxidants which protect the cells against the consequences of the damage which is induced by free radicals, due to their ability to react with the latter (17),(19). Both the intra-cellular and the extra cellular redox states of thiols play a critical role in the determination of the protein structure and function, the regulation of the enzymatic activity of the transcription factors and antioxidant protection (20). In a recent study, it was calculated that the SH protein groups contributed a 52.9% load to the measured serum total antioxidant capacity in healthy subjects (21). The plasma total thiols are considered to be the major components of anti-oxidant defence system (2) and they are reported to be decreased in general alcoholics (22),(23),(24). In the present study, we have also demonstrated the decreased levels of T-SH in chronic alcoholics. Muttigi et al (2009) (25) have reported the increased GST activity and the decreased total thiols status in general alcoholics. The low levels of protein thiols which correlate negatively with the levels of AOPPs, a condition which is termed as ‘thiol stress’ may be contribute in to the pathogenesis of ALD. The activity of plasma GST correlated negatively with the concentration of T-SH. In alcoholics, thiols stress may be quantitatively important due to its reversible and treatable nature. Moreover, the reduced total thiols pool may have been caused due to the decreased concentration of albumin, as was observed in the present study. Albumin is known to be synthesized in the liver and damage to the hepatocytes might be responsible for the decrease in the albumin concentration. Albumin is the main contributing factor to the total T-SH pool of plasma.
The strong negative correlation of GST with the T-SH levels indicated that as the concentration of T-SH decreased, there was a corresponding increase in the activity of GST. This may be because of the increased in the alcohol induced oxidative stress and the increased utilization of T-SH from the thiols. Our study confirmed the observations of earlier studies, but with a different patient population in a different geographical location.
The authors would like to express their sincere thanks to Dr H.C. Mehta, Ex Professor and Head, Dept. of Biochemistry, PGIMS, Rohtak for providing the research facilities. We are also thankful to Dr Rajesh Pandey, Associate Professor Biochemistry, MMIMSR, Mullana (Ambala) and Dr Seema Gupta, MD Biochemistry for their cooperation.
ID: JCDR/2012/3601:1859
FINANCIAL OR OTHER COMPETING INTERESTS: NONE.
Date of Submission: Nov 11, 2011
Date of Peer Review: Dec 06, 2011
Date of Acceptance: Dec 22, 2011
Date of Publishing: Feb 15, 2012
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