The Role of Values in Social Change: An Analysis from The Qur’ānic Perspective

In the post-industrial revolution world, social change is often studied and understood in the context of change in means of production, mobility, urbanization and change in the constitution of workforce. Role of ethical values is generally confined to personal conduct and manners. Industrial society is supposed to have its own work ethics which may or may not agree with personal ethics and morality. Ethics and morality are generally considered, in the Western thought, as a social construct. Therefore, with the change in means of production or political system, values and morality are also expected to be re-adjusted in order to cope with the changed environment. Sometimes a totally new set of values emerges as a consequence of the change in economic, political, or legal set up. The present research tries to understand the meaning and place of these values in a global socio-cultural framework. Relying essentially on the divine principles of the Qur'ān it makes an effort to understand relevance of these universal and ultimate principles with human conduct and behavior in society.  It indicates that essentially it is the core values, principles, or norms which guide human beings in their interpersonal, social, economic and political matters. Islam being a major civilizing force, culture, and the way of life, provides values which guide both in individual and social matters. The values given by the Qur’ān and the Sunnah are not monopoly of the Muslim. These values are universal and are relevant in a technological society.

Evaluation of Potential Biomarkers and Risk Factors for Cognitive Impairment

Cognitive impairment (CI) is a neuropathological condition that include deficit of visuospatial skills, thoughts, attention, learning, language and memory. CI has recently emerged as one of the most important health threat to old age individuals. The cognitive abilities are influenced by various factors, such as, genetics, environment, diet, age and life style. Human exposure to heavy metals and high fat diet (HFD) consumption are potential risk factors for developing CI. It is necessary to establish reliable serum based biomarkers and the genetic determinants, for CI and its progression, hence to comprehend the underlying mechanism of the disease. Therefore, this study aimed to investigate the possible association between the concentration of heavy metals and the extent of cognitive impairment. We also assessed serum based biomarkers including high density lipoprotein (HDL), low density lipoprotein (LDL), triglycerides, total cholesterol, totaltau and serum amyloid β-42 protein. The genetic determinants including APOE polymorphism and mutations of exon 16 and 17 of the amyloid precursor protein (APP) gene were studied. We examined 183 patients diagnosed with cognitive impairment; mild (n=72), moderate (n=86) and severe (n=25) based on their mini mental state examination (MMSE) score and compared them with age-matched healthy controls (n=90). All the subjects were interviewed on a specially designed performa to obtain demographic data, history and co-morbidities. The level of Copper(Cu), Lead(Pb), Aluminum(Al), Zinc(Zn), Cadmium(Cd) and Manganese(Mn) were measured in blood samples, after microwave assisted acid digestion, using atomic absorption spectrophotometry. Results showed that all the aforementioned elements were significantly higher in the cognitively impaired patients and increasing concentration was observed with the increase in severity of the disease. The correlation study has shown that among the studied metals, Al and Cu were strongly associated with the CI. The results of serum biomarkers have shown that severity of the disease increases with decrease in the concentration of HDL cholesterol and amyloid β-42. On the other hand, increase in LDL cholesterol, triglyceride, total cholesterol and total-tau were associated with the disease progression. Correlation studies revealed strong association between amyloid β-42, HDL cholesterol and total-tau with MMSE score. Receiver Operating Characteristic (ROC) showed the cutoff values of total-tau and amyloid β-42 with sensitivity and specificity; depicted that serum level of these proteins can be used as a predictive marker for CI. The genotyping results showed association of APOE4 allele with CI and a higher association was observed with severe CI group. However the sequence analysis of exon 16 and 17 of APP revealed no mutations. To further validate our results we examined the effect of metals and HFD in animal model to evaluate the neuropathological changes in young brain and compared it with untreated young mice (8-11 weeks = 2-3 months) and aged mice (12 months) to understand the underlying molecular mechanisms. Mice were given 300ppm of Al, Cu, Pb and Cd in drinking water and HFD feed (40% of the feed weight was animal fat)for 42 days. Metals+HFD treated mice were subjected to behavior tests, such as, Morris water maze, elevated plus maze, fear condition and contextual memory to evaluate memory levels. Spatial memory, contextual memory and fear memory were significantly impaired in metals+HFD group compared to young mice. The extent of neurodegeneration with metals+HFD co-exposure was considerably high in hippocampus and cortex, compared to aged mice brain and untreated young mice. Increased oxidative stress was recorded in the cortex, hippocampus and amygdala of metals+HFD group. The acetylcholine concentration was decreased in cortex, hippocampus and amygdala of metals+HFD group, explaining the cholinergic deficits that caused cognitive impairment. Among the studied metals, Al was found to be highly accumulated in cortex, hippocampus and amygdala followed by Pb, Cu and Cd. Hippocampus showed greater accumulation of metals than cortex and amygdala. These data provided novel evidences that combined administration of metals and HFD enhanced aging process, caused memory impairment, cholinergic hypofunction, elevated oxidative stress and neurodegeneration in young mice. This study suggested the need for a decrease in metal exposure to humans from environment, food and industries. Also reported for the first time, is the association of total and fractional cholesterol, total-tau and amyloid β-42 as serum biomarkers andAPOE4 allele as a risk factor for cognitively impaired patients from Pakistan.