Aalt Bast

Maastricht University | UM · Department of Pharmacology and Toxicology

It is generally accepted that reactive oxygen species (ROS) play an important role in the pathogenesis of liver fibrosis. ROS, however, constitute a group of species with varying properties making it likely that their contribution to the pathological mechanism varies. LX-2 hepatic stellate cells (HSCs) were exposed to superoxide anion radicals (O2(...

Europe's push towards a single harmonised market that offers information on the benefits of foods is encapsulated in Regulation (EC) No 1924/2006, the Nutrition and Health Claims Regulation (NHCR). The NHCR will be the main focus of our contribution. Our contention is that this regulation not only stifles scientific research, limiting it to the rel...

http://www.cell.com/trends/pharmacological-sciences/abstract/S0165-6147(13)00098-9 http://download.cell.com/trends/pharmacological-sciences/pdf/PIIS0165614713000989.pdf?intermediate=true Oxidative damage is a common cellular event involved in numerous diseases and drug toxicities. Antioxidants prevent or delay oxidative damage, and therefore th...

Plasma citrate levels were found to be elevated in nonalcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD) patients. Cellular experiments indicated that increased citrate levels might originate from an excess of fatty acids. The impact of elevated citrate levels on oxidative stress was examined. It was found that citrate stimulated hydrogen peroxide induced intra...

Background Vitamin K is essential for numerous physiological processes, including coagulation, bone metabolism, tissue calcification, and antioxidant activity. Deficiency, prevalent in critically ill ICU patients, impacts coagulation and increases the risk of bleeding and other complications. This review aims to elucidate the metabolism of vitamin...

Sarcoidosis is a systemic inflammatory disorder characterized by granuloma formation in various organs. It has been associated with nephrolithiasis. The vitamin K epoxide reductase complex subunit 1 (VKORC1) gene, which plays a crucial role in vitamin K metabolism, has been implicated in the activation of proteins associated with calcification, inc...

Background Pulmonary toxicity has been associated with drug use. This is often not recognized in clinical practice, and underestimated. Objective We aimed to establish whether polymorphisms in certain genes corresponding with a metabolic pathway of drug(s) used are associated with pulmonary toxicity in patients with suspected drug-induced intersti...

Purpose In this case study, we examine how a citrus peel valorising company based in the Netherlands was able to adopt a circular business model while navigating regulatory, managerial, and supply chain-related barriers. Design/methodology/approach In-depth, semi-structured interviews with key personnel in the company, notes from field observation...

People’s perception on what is healthy and what is toxic food, determines food preferences and eating behavior. The difference between heathy and toxic food and food ingredients is however not always clear. This is illustrated with 10 examples. Unjustly, all-natural food is regarded as safe. Regulation on health claims on food and food risks is not...

Background Extra-hepatic vitamin K-status, measured by dephosphorylated uncarboxylated matrix Gla protein (dp-ucMGP), maintains vascular health, with high levels reflecting poor vitamin K status. The occurrence of extra-hepatic vitamin K deficiency throughout the disease of COVID-19 and possible associations with pulmonary embolism (PE), and mortal...

Background and aims Observational data indicate that diets rich in fruits and vegetables have a positive effect on inflammatory status, improve metabolic resilience and may protect against the development of non-communicable diseases. Nevertheless, experimental evidence demonstrating a causal relationship between nutrient intake (especially whole f...

The repurposing of surplus food and food processing by-products is a key aspect of the shift towards a circular bioeconomy. In the Netherlands, food supply chain actors are already working towards making better use of agri-food surpluses to improve food security and resource efficiency. By analysing the experiences of these actors, this study aims...

Background and aims As our understanding of platelet activation in response to infections and/or inflammatory conditions is growing, it is becoming clearer that safe, yet efficacious, platelet-targeted phytochemicals could improve public health beyond the field of cardiovascular diseases. The phytonutrient sulforaphane shows promise for clinical us...

Ionic valency influences oral processing by changing salivary behavior and merits more attention since little is known. In this study, the influence of three ionic valences (monovalent, divalent and trivalent), ionic strength and epigallocatechin gallate (EGCG) on lubricating properties of saliva were investigated. Tribological measurements were us...

Background & Aims: The role of nutrition in modulating the inflammatory response is increasingly recognized. The phytonutrient sulforaphane shows promise for clinical use due to its effect on inflammatory pathways, favorable pharmacokinetic profile, and high bioavailability. The inflammatory status has been linked to autonomic activity, which can b...

Nutrition and health claims can help translate nutrition and health recommendations into easier-to-access messages at the point of sale. National Food Composition Databases (FCDBs) are the main and most widely available source of nutrient information for unpacked foods, such as fruits and vegetables. This paper outlines the variability of the nutri...

The objective of this study was to investigate the influence of tannins and gallic acid on the salivary lubrication behavior. Furthermore, the effects of pH and mannoproteins in combination with gallic acid on the lubrication of saliva were studied. The addition of gallic acid and tannins were found to increase friction caused by the removal of the...

Purpose of review: Sarcoidosis is a chronic multisystemic inflammatory disease of unknown aetiology with a wide range of highly variable clinical manifestations and unpredictable disease course. Sarcoidosis patients may present with specific organ-related symptoms involving functional impairments, and less specific symptoms. The decision whether a...

Purpose of review: Drug use in elderly people is high compared to younger people. Simultaneously, elderly are at greater risk when exposed to environmental substances. It is puzzling therefore, that ageing, as a variable in pharmacological and toxicological processes is not investigated in more depth. Moreover, recent data suggest that molecular m...

Purpose of review: Cellular senescence has been recognized as a promising target in the treatment of many cardiovascular diseases. The pathways involved in the development of senescence share many similarities with pathobiological mechanisms of pulmonary arterial hypertension (PAH). But the potential of senolytics to improve pulmonary hemodynamics...

The COVID-19 pandemic has been detrimental to food security globally. The Netherlands, despite its advanced stage of development, saw a surge in food insecurity among its most vulnerable citizens. Dutch food aid is managed by private charities and social organisations that often aim to address the problems of food insecurity and food waste by redis...

Since it is observed that the consumption of herbal dietary supplements is increasing, we aimed to research whether front-of-pack risk and benefit information influences a consumer’s intention to use (ITU) a dietary supplement. A total of 268 subjects participated in an online questionnaire, in which they were exposed to one of four different label...

Background There is considerable interest among consumers in using 'natural', plant-based nutritional supplements for their purported health benefits. However, the data required to support health claims on these so-called botanicals is subject to an ongoing debate, especially in Europe. Remarkably, pharmaceutical regulations have a provision that s...

The Common Fisheries Policy of the European Union was reformed in 2013 with the aim of improving the sustainability of the fishing sector. The Landing Obligation, a cornerstone of this reform, requires fishers to land their unwanted catch instead of discarding it at sea. Existing literature pays little attention to what becomes of this unwanted cat...

Introduction: Simvastatin has previously been associated with drug-induced interstitial lung disease. In this retrospective observational study, cases with non-specific interstitial pneumonia (NSIP) or idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis (IPF) with simvastatin-associated pulmonary toxicity (n = 34) were evaluated. Objective: To identify whether variatio...

Purpose Taste receptors are expressed throughout the gastrointestinal tract. The activation of post-oral taste receptors using tastants could provide a non-invasive treatment option in combating the obesity epidemic. The aim of this review was to examine the effect of post-oral delivery of non-caloric tastants on eating behavior reflected by primar...

Thermal treatment of food products leads to the formation of dietary advanced glycation endproducts (dAGEs). It was previously shown that dAGEs induce TNF-α secretion in human macrophage-like cells. To what extent gastrointestinal digestion of dAGEs influences these pro-inflammatory effects and what the implications of these pro-inflammatory charac...

Purpose of the review: Critical review on the notion that exposure to pesticides and herbicides lead to adverse effects in pulmonary health. Recent findings: The lung effects of several chemical classes of pesticides and herbicides is biologically plausible. However, the studies that describe the association between exposure and toxic lung effec...

The importance of a well-functioning and balanced immune system has become more apparent in recent decades. Various elements have however not yet been uncovered as shown, for example, in the uncertainty on immune system responses to COVID-19. Fungal beta-glucans are bioactive molecules with immunomodulating properties. Insights into the effects and...

Food businesses in the European Union are preparing for a carbon-neutral future by gradually transitioning to a circular way of operating. Building upon results from the EU REFRESH project, we consider the most valuable food processing by-streams in Europe and discuss potential food safety risks that must be considered while valorizing them for hum...

Private food safety standards have become an important governance mechanism in contemporary food supply chains. While much has been written about private standards from the perspectives of different academic fields, there has never been a dedicated literature review to examine their interaction with global food supply chains. In this systematic rev...

Food variety has been shown to increase food intake, and sensory-specific satiety (a relative decrease in pleasantness of a food as it is consumed) has been proposed as the mechanism through which variety increases consumption. The aim of this study was to investigate whether variation of eating context can add to experienced meal variety and hence...

Preeclampsia complicates 5–8% of all pregnancies worldwide, and although its pathophysiology remains obscure, placental oxidative stress and mitochondrial abnormalities are considered to play a key role. Mitochondrial abnormalities in preeclamptic placentae have been described, but the extent to which mitochondrial content and the molecular pathway...

Introduction Impaired utero-placental perfusion is a well-known feature of early preeclampsia and is associated with placental hypoxia and oxidative stress. Although aberrations at the level of the mitochondrion have been implicated in PE pathophysiology, whether or not hypoxia-induced mitochondrial abnormalities contribute to placental oxidative s...

Background The evaluation of botanical health claims was put on hold to determine whether traditional use evidence is sufficient to substantiate these health claims. To gain a deeper understanding of the discussion on the substantiation of botanical health claims, a critical review of the stakeholders’ arguments was conducted. Methods The relation...

The exposure of living organisms to environmental stress triggers defensive responses resulting in the activation of protective processes. Whenever the exposure occurs at low doses, defensive effects overwhelm the adverse effects of the exposure; this adaptive situation is referred to as "hormesis". Environmental, physical, and nutritional hormetin...

Background and aims: In recent years, it has become clear that low-grade chronic inflammation is involved in the onset and progression of many non-communicable diseases. Many studies have investigated the association between inflammation and lycopene, however, results have been inconsistent. This systematic review aims to determine the impact of c...

The 90-day toxicity study is one of the studies used in the safety assessment of food ingredients, medicines or other chemical substances. This paper reviews the current role of the 90-day oral toxicity study in European regulatory dossiers of chemicals by reviewing EU legislation and EU and OECD guidance documents. Regulatory provisions with regar...

The prevalence of inflammatory bowel diseases (IBD) is increasing in the world. The introduction of the Western diet has been suggested as a potential explanation of increased prevalence. The Western diet includes highly processed food products, and often include thermal treatment. During thermal treatment, the Maillard reaction can occur, leading...

Consumers of dietary supplements should be made aware of the benefits and risks of these products. This case study therefore aimed to identify the content of the risk-benefit information provided during the purchase of St. John's wort supplements and how consumers perceive this information. Fifteen participants visited a shop to purchase St. John's...

Characteristics of a food product are the backbone of sensory research and it is essential to describe the food flavor with well-defined and agreed-upon concepts. This paper reviews the current bibliography related to taste/flavor perception, with a particular focus on mouthfeel. A summary of the current mouthfeel vocabularies is given and research...

Objectives To study the effects of running with/without the use of pain killers on urinary neutrophil gelatinase‐associated lipocalin (uNGAL) and other parameters of kidney function in recreational runners. Methods Participants of the 10‐ and 21.1‐km Weir Venloop race were enrolled and their urine samples collected before and after the run. Urine...

Preeclampsia (PE) is a pregnancy-related disorder characterized by hypertension and proteinuria that affects 3–10% of all pregnancies. Although its pathophysiology remains obscure, placental hypoxia-induced oxidative stress and alterations in vascular function, morphology, and endothelial barrier integrity are considered to play a key role in the d...

Stimulation of gastrointestinal taste receptors affects eating behaviour. Intraduodenal infusion of tastants leads to increased satiation and reduced food intake, whereas intraileal infusions of tastants does not affect eating behaviour. Currently, it is unknown whether oral- or intragastric administration of tastants induces a larger effect on eat...

Protein- and sugar-rich food products processed at high temperatures contain large amounts of dietary advanced glycation endproducts (dAGEs). Our earlier studies have shown that specifically protein-bound dAGEs induce a pro-inflammatory reaction in human macrophage-like cells. To what extent these protein-bound dAGEs survive the human gastrointesti...

Nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs are frequently used by athletes in order to prevent musculoskeletal pain and improve performance. In combination with strenuous exercise, they can contribute to a reduction of renal blood flow and promote development of kidney damage. We aimed to investigate whether monomeric and oligomeric flavanols (MOF) could...

Purpose of the review: Idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis (IPF) is a terminal lung disease of largely unknown cause. Gastroesophageal reflux disease (GERD) was recently discovered to be a trigger for the development of IPF. The current pharmaceutical approach to IPF falls short and there is a pressing need for improved therapeutic options. The present...

Purpose of review: The current review aims to seek attention for the interaction between drugs and nutrition. Traditionally, drugs and nutrition are regarded as separate categories. Nutrition is to maintain health and drugs are for curing disease. Dieticians deal with food and the medical doctor prescribes drugs. During the last decade, both categ...

Background: Idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis (IPF) is a chronic, lethal disease of which the etiology is still not fully understood. Current treatment comprises two FDA-approved drugs that can slow down yet not stop or reverse the disease. As IPF pathology is associated with an altered redox balance, adding a redox modulating component to current the...

Drugs are serious but underestimated causative agents of interstitial lung disease (ILD). Both cytotoxic and immune mechanisms may be involved in drug-induced ILD (DI-ILD). We aimed to investigate whether polymorphisms of relevant CYP enzymes involved in the metabolization of tamsulosin might explain the pathologic mechanism of the DI-ILD in the ca...

Background Clinical manifestations of sarcoidosis vary widely, depending on the intensity of the inflammation and the organ systems affected. So far, no curative treatment exists; the disease can only be suppressed. All treatment options cause side effects affecting quality of life. The aim of this study was to establish and rank the prevalence of...

The use of vitamin B6 supplements has gained lots of attention over the past years as they have been related to the development of peripheral neuropathy. The present study focused on the pharmacokinetics of vitamin B6. Twelve healthy volunteers were daily supplemented with either 50 mg pyridoxine or pyridoxal-phosphate for one week. On days 1, 3 an...

Glucocorticoids are very effective anti-inflammatory drugs and widely used for inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) patients. However, approximately 20% of IBD patients do not respond to glucocorticoids and the reason for this is largely unknown. Dietary advanced glycation endproducts (AGEs) are formed via the Maillard reaction during the thermal proce...

Background and Purpose The flavonoid quercetin increased the in vitro potency of the α1‐antagonist tamsulosin to reduce phenylephrine‐dependent arterial contractions by 10‐fold. To examine if this supplement–drug interaction luxates hypotensive and orthostatic events in vivo, several set of studies were conducted in spontaneously hypertensive (SHR)...

Ingestion of (-)-epicatechin flavanols reverses endothelial dysfunction by increasing flow mediated dilation and by reducing vascular inflammation and oxidative stress, monocyte-endothelial cell adhesion and transendothelial monocyte migration in vitro and in vivo. This involves multiple changes in gene expression and epigenetic DNA methylation by...

Purpose Idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis (IPF) is an inexorably progressive disease, which has a great impact on patients’ lives. Pirfenidone and nintedanib are approved and recommended antifibrotic drugs for patients with IPF. The aim of this study was to evaluate self-reported gastrointestinal side effects of antifibrotic drugs in 176 Dutch IPF pati...

With great interest, we have read the paper by Alexandre et al. (1). They investigated Diffuse Alveolar Hemorrhage (DAH) in various disorders and concluded that "DAH appears to be a heterogeneous syndrome". The authors could not define a common pathway for DAH. We would like to emphasize that in our opinion not the underlying disorder is not the ca...

Background Idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis (IPF) is a chronic, lethal disease of unknown etiology. Current treatment comprises two FDA-approved drugs that can slow down yet not stop or reverse the disease. As IPF pathology is associated with an altered redox balance, adding a redox modulating component to current therapy might exert beneficial effect...

This undeniably exceptional case shows that the trigger of a sarcoid-like reaction might be make-up containing talc. It emphasizes that talc exposures should be considered in case of skin lesions as well as other manifestations of sarcoidosis or sarcoid-like reactions.

Background Idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis (IPF) is a chronic, lethal disease of unknown etiology. Current treatment comprises two FDA-approved drugs that can slow down yet not stop or reverse the disease. As IPF pathology is associated with an altered redox balance, adding a redox modulating component to current therapy might exert beneficial effect...

Background Idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis (IPF) is a chronic, lethal disease of which the etiology is still not fully understood. Current treatment comprises two FDA-approved drugs that can slow down yet not stop or reverse the disease. As IPF pathology is associated with an altered redox balance, adding a redox modulating component to current thera...

Food variety has been shown to enhance consumption, and it has repeatedly been proposed that this variety effect might operate by delaying the development of sensory-specific satiation (SSS; a relative decrease in pleasantness of a specific food as it is consumed). This study aimed to advance our understanding of the presumed relationship between S...

The efficacy of botanicals in medicines can be substantiated with evidence on traditional use, whereas in foodstuffs, this is often not possible. In Europe, for example, the evaluation and subsequent authorization of health claims on herbal dietary supplements (HDS) have been put on hold by the European Commission. This study aims to analyze the ro...

Purpose of review: The diagnosis of drug-induced interstitial lung disease (DI-ILD) is challenging and mainly made by exclusion of other possible causes. Toxicity can occur as a cause of drug(s) or drug-drug interactions. In this review, we summarize the possible role of pharmacogenetics of metabolizing enzymes in DI-ILD. Recent findings: Knowle...