• The Journal of Internal Korean Medicine
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• v.29 no.1
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• pp.42-66
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• 2008

Aconiti Tuber is a traditional medicinal plant generally used in Oriental medicine therapy. In this study, we investigated the biochemical mechanisms of anti-proliferative effects by the methanol extract of Aconiti tuber (MEBJ) in Caki-1 human renal cell carcinoma cells. It was found that MEBJ could inhibit, in a dose-dependent manner, cell growth which was associated with apoptotic cell death such as formation of apoptotic bodies, DNA fragmentation and increased populations of apoptotic-sub G1 phase. Apoptosis of Caki-1 cells by MEBJ was associated with an up-regulation of pro-apoptotic Bax expression, and a down-regulation of anti-apoptotic Bcl-2 in a dose-dependent manner; however, the levels of IAP family were not affected. MEBJ treatment also induced the proteolytic activation of caspase-3 and -8, and a inhibition of poly(ADP-ribose) polymerase (PARP) and $PLC{\gamma}1$ protein. Furthermore, MEBJ treatment caused a dose-dependent inhibition of iNOS and cyclooxygenase-2 (Cox-2). Though further studies will be needed to identify the active compounds that confer the anti-cancer activity of MEBJ, the present findings provide important new insights into the possible molecular mechanisms of the apoptotic activity of MEBJ in cancer cells.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Food Science and Nutrition
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• v.39 no.7
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• pp.953-959
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• 2010

We extracted bioactive materials from Codium fragile by enzymatic hydrolysis using four different proteases (Alcalase, Flavourzyme, Neutrase, and Protamex) and seven different carbohydrases (amyloglucosidase (AMG), Celluclast, Dextrozyme, Maltogenase, Promozyme, Termamyl, and Viscozyme), and evaluated their biological activities such as antioxidant, anti-acetylcholinesterase (AChE), and anti-inflammatory effects. All enzymatic hydrolysates showed good DPPH radical scavenging capacities, in particular, Flavourzyme and Promozyme hydrolysates possessed the highest activity. The two hydrolysates also exhibited strong hydrogen peroxide scavenging activity, $Fe^{2+}$ chelating activity, and reducing power in a dose-dependent manner. Furthermore, the two hydrolysates effectively protected DNA damage induced by hydroxyl radical by measuring the conversion of supercoiled DNA to the open circular DNA. All enzymatic hydrolysates also showed high anti-AChE inhibitory activities in a dose-dependent manner, and did not showed any significant cytotoxicity on RAW264.7 cells (p<0.05). In addition, the enzymatic hydrolysates significantly (p<0.05) inhibited lipopolysaccharide induced-nitric oxide production on RAW264.7 cells. These results suggest that the enzymatic extracts from Codium fragile would be good source as an ingredient of functional foods.

• Journal of Life Science
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• v.18 no.8
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• pp.1042-1048
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• 2008

Prostate cancer is the most predominant cancer in men and related death rate increases every year. Till date, there is no effective therapy for androgen independent prostate cancer. To investigate the mechanism for cell growth inhibition or apoptosis in human androgen independent prostate cancer PC-3 cells after gamma irradiation. The aim of this study was to examine the potential of gamma irradiation to induce apoptosis in PC-3 cells and to assess the mechanism of gamma irradiation-induced apoptosis. Five different assays were employed in this study: cell proliferation assay, morphological assessments of apoptotic cells, DNA fragmentation analysis, quantification of apoptosis by annexin V (AV) and propidium iodide (PI) staning, and western blot analysis. Cell viability was inversely related to radiation dose. DAPI-positive cells were detected 48 hr after 40 Gy radiation exposure. And nuclear morphological changes of cells were observed by gamma irradiation. DNA ladder patterns in the cells exposed to gamma-radiation were appeared at 24 hr. Also, gamma irradiation induces apoptosis of PC-3 cells via Caspase3, Bax and PARP-dependent fashion.

• Journal of Life Science
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• v.13 no.5
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• pp.642-650
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• 2003

To develop a new approach to the treatment of neuroblastoma cells we evaluated the effect of cAMP on the Ewing's sarcoma cell line CHP-100. We observed that the proliferation-inhibitory effect of cAMP analogs was due to cell cycle arrest and induction of apoptosis, which was confirmed by observing the morphological changes and DNA fragmentation. DNA flow cytometric analysis revealed that cAMP arrested the cell cycle progression at the G1 phase, which effects were associated with inhibition of phosphorylation of retinoblastoma protein (pRB) and enhanced binding of pRB and the transcription factor E2F-1. cAMP also suppressed the cyclin-dependent kinase (Cdk) 2 and cyclin E-associated kinase activity without changes of their expressions. Furthermore, cAMP induced the levels of Cdk inhibitor $p21^{WAF1/CIP1$ expression and p21 proteins induced by cAMP were associated with Cdk2. Overall, our results identify a combined mechanism involving the inhibition of pRB phosphorylation and induction of p21 as targets for cAMP, and this may explain some of its anti-cancer effects.

• Asian Pacific Journal of Cancer Prevention
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• v.17 no.3
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• pp.1499-1506
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• 2016

Background: Crocus sativus and its major constituent crocin are well established to have anti-cancer properties in breast cancer cells (MCF-7). However the role of C. sativus extract (CSE) and crocin on caspase signaling mediated MCF-7 cell death at molecular level is remains unclear. In this study, we tried to unravel role of CSE and crocin on caspase mediated MCF-7 cells death and their in vivo preclinical toxicity profiling and immune stimulatory effect. Materials and Methods: CSE extract was fractionated by HPLC and crocin was isolated and characterized by NMR, IR, and MS. MCF-7 cells were treated with both CSE and crocin and expression of Bcl-2 and Bax was assessed after 24 and 36 hours. Furthermore, caspase 3, caspase 8 and caspase 9 expression was determined by Western blotting after 24 hours of treatment. DNA fragmentation analysis was performed for genotoxicity of CSE and crocin in MCF-7 cells. The in vivo toxicity profile of CSE (300 mg/kg of b.wt) was investigated in normal Swiss albino mice. In addition, peritoneal macrophages were collected from crocin (1, 1.5 and 2 mg/kg body weight) treated mice and analyzed for ex vivo yeast phagocytosis. Results: Immunoblot analysis revealed that there was time dependent decline in anti-apoptotic Bcl-2 with simultaneous upregulation of Bax in CSE and crocin treated MCF-7 cells. Further CSE and crocin treatment downregulated caspase 8 and 9 and cleaved the caspase 3 after 24 hours. Both CSE and crocin elicited considerable DNA damage in MCF-7 cells at each concentration tested. In vivo toxicity profile by histological studies revealed no observable histopathologic differences in the liver, kidney, spleen, lungs and heart in CSE treated and untreated groups. Crocin treatment elicited significant dose and time dependent ex vivo yeast phagocytosis by peritoneal macrophages. Conclusions: Our study delineated involvement of pro-apoptotic and caspase mediated MCF-7 cell death by CSE and crocin at the molecular level accompanied with extensive DNA damage. Further we found that normal swiss albino mice can tolerate the maximum dose of CSE. Crocin enhanced ex vivo macrophage yeast phagocytic ability.

• Microbiology and Biotechnology Letters
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• v.38 no.4
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• pp.442-447
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• 2010

We investigated anti-cancer and anti-proliferative activity of allicin and analyzed global gene expression changes by allicin treatment in human colorectal HCT116 cells. As a result, allicin decreased cell viabilities in a dose and time-dependent manner and induced apoptosis. Oligo DNA microarray analysis, we found that 7,840 genes were up-regulated more than 2-folds, whereas 10,010 genes were down-regulated more than 2-folds by $50\;{\mu}M$ allicin treatment. To confirm specific gene expressions, we performed RT-PCR. Consistent with the results of DNA microarray analysis, allicin dramatically induced ATF3 and NAG1 gene expression. Interestingly, NAG-1 protein expression was dependent on p53 presence. Taken together, our present results increase the knowledge of the molecular mechanism of anti-cancer and anti-proliferative activity mediated by allciin in human colorectal cancer cell.

• Clinical and Experimental Reproductive Medicine
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• v.50 no.1
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• pp.44-52
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• 2023

Objective: The DNA integrity of spermatozoa that attach to fallopian tube (FT) cells is higher than spermatozoa that do not attach. FT epithelial cells can distinguish normal and abnormal sperm chromatin. This study investigated the effects of sperm with a high-DNA fragmentation index (DFI) from men with unexplained repeated implantation failure (RIF) on the Toll-like receptor (TLR) signaling pathway in human FT cells in vitro. Methods: Ten men with a RIF history and high-DFI and 10 healthy donors with low-DFI comprised the high-DFI (>30%) and control (<30%) groups, respectively. After fresh semen preparation, sperm were co-cultured with a human FT epithelial cell line (OE-E6/E7) for 24 hours. RNA was extracted from the cell line and the human innate and adaptive immune responses were tested using an RT2 profiler polymerase chain reaction (PCR) array. Results: The PCR array data showed significantly higher TLR-1, TLR-2, TLR-3, TLR-6, interleukin 1α (IL-1α), IL-1β, IL-6, IL-12, interferon α (IFN-α), IFN-β, tumor necrosis factor α (TNF-α), CXCL8, GM-CSF, G-CSF, CD14, ELK1, IRAK1, IRAK2, IRAK4, IRF1, IRF3, LY96, MAP2K3, MAP2K4, MAP3K7, MAP4K4, MAPK8, MAPK8IP3, MYD88, NFKB1, NFKB2, REL, TIRAP, and TRAF6 expression in the high-DFI group than in the control group. These factors are all involved in the TLR-MyD88 signaling pathway. Conclusion: The MyD88-dependent pathway through TLR-1, TLR-2, and TLR-6 activation may be one of the main inflammatory pathways activated by high-DFI sperm from men with RIF. Following activation of this pathway, epithelial cells produce inflammatory cytokines, resulting in neutrophil infiltration, activation, phagocytosis, neutrophil extracellular trap formation, and apoptosis.

• Environmental Mutagens and Carcinogens
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• v.18 no.2
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• pp.71-76
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• 1998

Exposure to environmental toxicants can cause cellular problems including the interference of DNA repair processes which may lead to the development of cancer. The existence of toxicant-induced DNA repair abnormality was investigated using mice exposed in vivo to genotoxic chemicals and then challenging their exposed lymphocytes in vitro with bleomycin. The repair of bleomycin-induced DNA damage as estimated by the frequency of chromosome aberrations was determined. Our data indicates that the observed aberration frequencies after in vivo exposure to N-methyl-N'-nitro-N-nitnsoguanidine (MNNG) and in vitro challenge with bleomycin are consistently higher than expected. The enhanced response is not due to the induction of chromosome damage by 25 or 50 mg/kg MNNG since the chemical did not cause chromosome aberrations in lymphocytes of these mice. The observed response after the combined exposure to benzo[a]pyrene (BP) and bleomycin was significantly lower than expected with low in vivo doses of BP (50 mg/kg) and then significantly higher than expected with the high doses (200 mg/kg). We interpret our data to indicate that in vivo exposure to genotoxic agents can cause abnormal DNA repair activities. The response is, however, independent of the clastogenic activities of the inducing chemicals, but dependent upon the inducing agents and on the exposure doses.

• Toxicological Research
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• v.22 no.2
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• pp.75-85
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• 2006

This study was designed to evaluate the possible DNA damaging effects of T-2 toxin using an alkaline single cell gel electrophoresis (SCGE) comet assay and also to investigate toxic effects in chickens. A total of 20 chickens were used in these experiments. Graded concentrations of dietary T-2 toxin (0, 4, 8, and $16{\mu}g/g$ of diet) were given to groups of 5 broiler chickens. In comet assay, The DNA damage was analysed by the tail extent moment (TEM) and tail length (TL), which were used as markers of DNA strand breaks in SCGE. A significant dose-dependent increase in the extent of DNA migration as well as in the percentage of cells with tails was observed after treatment with T-2 toxin (P<0.05). Treatment with the low T-2 toxin ($4{\mu}/g$ of diet) induced a relatively low level of DNA damage in comparison with the high T-2 toxin ($16{\mu}/g$ of diet) group. The growth rate was significantly reduced by concentrations of 8, and $16{\mu}/g$ of diet (P < 0.05). The feed conversion ratio were significantly affected by any concentrations (P < 0.05). The relative weight of the spleen, and lung was decreased by the growth inhibitory concentrations. The bursa of Fabricius, thymus, and kid- ney were decreased in relative weight by concentrations of $16{\mu}/g$ of diet. The relative weight of the liver and heart were unaffected. The hemoglobin (Hb), hematocrit (HCT), and mean corpuscular hemoglobin (MCH) were decreased at concentration of $16{\mu}/g$ of diet. As compared with control chickens, there was no marked change in serum components except uric acid in T-2 treated chickens. All lymphoid tissues retained atrophic and lymphoid cell depletion throughout the three weeks trial.

• Journal of Periodontal and Implant Science
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• v.26 no.4
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• pp.841-858
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• 1996

Epidermal growth factor(EGF) is one of polypeptide growth factors. EGF has been reported as a biological mediator which regulates activities of wound healing process including the cell proliferation, migration and metabolism. The purposes of this study is to evaluate the effects of EGF on the human periodontal ligament cells and human gingival fibroblast cells that promote regeneration of periodntal tissue. The mitogenic effects of epidermal growth factor on human periodontal ligament cells and human gingival fibroblasts were evaluated by determining the incorporation of 5-Bromo-2'-deoxy-uridine into DNA of the cells in a dose dependent manner. The prepared cells were the primary cultured gingival fibroblast and periodontal ligament cells from humans, the fourth or sixth subpassages were used in the experiments. Cells were seeded in DMEM containing 10% FBS. 1, 10, 50, 100, $200{\eta}g/ml$ and epidermal growth factor were added to the quiescent cells for 24 hours, 48 hours and 72 hours. They were labeled with $10\{mu}l/200{\mu}l$ 5-Bromo-2'-deoxy-uridine for the last 6 hours of each culture. The results of the five determinants were presented as mean and S.D.. The results were as follows : The DNA synthetic activity of human gingival fibroblasts were increased dose dependently by epidermal growth factor at 24 hours, 48 hours and 72 hours. The mitogenic effects were similar at the 24 and 48 hours of epidermal growth factor, but the DNA synthetic activity of human gingival fibroblasts generally decreased at 72 hours. The DNA synthetic activity of human periodontal ligament cells were increased dose dependently by epidermal growth factor at 24 hours but the DNA synthetic activity decreased at $200{\eta}g/ml$ of each hour. Generally the maximum mitogenic effects were observed at the 48 hours application of epidermal growth factor. The DNA synthetic activity of human periodontal ligament cells generally decreased lower at 24, 72 hours than at 48 hours the application of epidermal growth factor. In the comparison of DNA synthetic activity between human gingival fibroblasts and human periodontal ligament cells, human periodontal ligament cells had slightly higher proliferation activity than human gingival fibroblasts for a longer time at the high dosage of the epidermal growth factor. In conclusion, epidermal growth factor have important roles in the stimulation of DNA synthesis in human periodontal ligament cells and human gingival fibroblasts, and thus may be useful for clinical applications in periodontal regenerative procedures.