• Journal of Korean Traditional Oncology
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• v.11 no.1
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• pp.41-54
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• 2006

Ekongsan (EKS) was expected to have inhibitory effects on angiogenesis, considering the fact that its constituents such as Ginseng Radix, Glycyrrhizae Radix and Citri Pericarpium were reported to inhibit angiogenesis. Moreover, recently several metabolites transformed by the human intestinal microflora were reported to enhance effectiveness compared to their crude drugs. Based on these data, this study was designed to confirm whether the EKS metabolites (EKS-M) can significantly exert the anti-angiogenic and anti-metastatic activites. Hence, with EKS and EKS-M, viability assay, proliferation assay, in vitro tube formation assay, gelatin zymogram assay, in vitro invasion assay were carried out. EKS showed less toxicity in ECV304 and HT1080 cells than EKS-M. EKS-M inhibited the proliferation of HT1080 cells by 30% at 200 ${\mu}g/m{\ell}$ and 42% at 400 ${\mu}g/m{\ell}$ respectively. Also, EKS-M degraded the tube network at 200 ${\mu}g/m{\ell}$. EKS and EKS-M inhibited the expression of MMP-9 at 200 and 400 ${\mu}g/m{\ell}$in HT1080 cells. EKS reduced the invasive activity of HT1080 cells through matrigel coated transfilter at the concentration of 200 ${\mu}g/m{\ell}$ more effectively than EKS-M. These data suggest that EKS and EKS-M has anti-angiogenic and anti-metastatic activities.

• Journal of Microbiology
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• v.43 no.4
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• pp.337-344
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• 2005

Although pneumococcus is one of the most frequently encountered opportunistic pathogen in the world, the mechanisms responsible for its infectiveness have not yet been fully understood. In this paper, we have attempted to characterize the effects of pneumococcal transformation on the pathogenesis of the organism. We constructed three transformation-deficient pneumococcal strains, which were designated as Nos. 1d, 2d, and 22d. The construction of these altered strains was achieved via the insertion of the inactivated gene, comE, to strains 1, 2 and 22. We then conducted a comparison between the virulence of the transformation-deficient strains and that of the wild-type strains, via an evaluation of the ability of each strain to adhere to endothelial cells, and also assessed psaA mRNA expression, and the survival of hosts after bacterial challenge. Compared to what was observed with the wild-type strains, our results indicated that the ability of all of the transformation-deficient strains to adhere to the ECV304 cells had been significantly reduced (p < 0.05), the expression of psaA mRNA was reduced significantly (p < 0.05) in strains 2d and 22d, and the median survival time of mice infected with strains Id and 2d was increased significantly after intraperitoneal bacterial challenge (p < 0.05). The results of our study also clearly indicated that transformation exerts significant effects on the virulence characteristics of S. pneumoniae, although the degree to which this effect is noted appears to depend primarily on the genetic background of the bacteria.