• Journal of Life Science
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• v.26 no.8
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• pp.970-975
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• 2016

Acne vulgaris is a common chronic skin disorder that affects millions of people. The pathogenesis of acne has been known to be closely associated with the bacterium Propionibacterium acnes. Here we investigated the anti-acne activity of Lactobacillus plantarum K-1 BR by observing the expressions of proinflammatory cytokines, TNF-α, IFN-γ and IL-8, of human keratinocytes. When we applied heat-killed P. acnes to HaCaT cells, the inflammatory cytokines were induced by two- to four-fold compared to the normal control. When the bacteriocin, purified from L. plantarum K-1 BR, was pretreated to the HaCaT cells, the expression levels of TNF-α and IFN-γ stimulated by P. acnes significantly decreased to 25% and 30% of the induced levels, respectively. The IL-8 levels also significantly decreased with the concentration dependent manner of the bacteriocin. These results suggest that the bacteriocin from L. plantarum K-1 BR could reduce the expression levels of inflammatory cytokines and thus may relieve inflammations caused by acne.

• Journal of fish pathology
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• v.6 no.1
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• pp.11-20
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• 1993

To study the immune responses of the japanese eel. Anguilla japonica, fish were injected intraperitoneally with several types of Edwardsiella tarda antigen, i. e., FKC(formalin killed cells), HKC(heat killed cells) or LPS(lipopolysaccharide), and the changes of immunocytes numbers, phagocytosis and agglutination titre in the peripheral blood of the fish were investigated. The number of lymphocytes in the peripheral blood of eels were decreased until 6 hours after injection, and then were turn to normal levels after 24 hours of injection. However, the level were slightly increased and were remained after 24 hours. The number of neutrophils of FKC, HKC or LPS injected fish were the highest at 12 hours after injection and were decreased slowly after that. Three weeks after the injections, the agglutination of antibody titre of all immunized groups were reached at 128 and were remained this level thereafter. However 6 weeks after the injections, that in HKC injected fish were dropped the level up to 4. Fish were injected with LPS and the blood from the fish were bled after 12 hours. Then the blood were incubated with E. tarda. Six hours after incubation, the phagocytic index was reached the highest level, 28.3. One week after the LPS injection, the blood were again bled and incubated with E. tarda. The phagocytic index at this time was 3.9. The phagocytic indexes of the fish injected with FKC and HKC, treted as same LPS injected fish as above, were 18.8 and 10.7, respectively. The phagocytic index of the control fish was 1.2. The antibacterial activities of normal antiserum against E. tarda were shown for both FKC and LPS injected fish, but not for HKC injected fish. The RPS(relative percentage of survival) of HKC, FKC and LPS injected fish in the challenge test were 10%, 20% and 30%, respectively. These results suggest that the effect of protection of the eel which were injected with antigen were varied with the method of preparation of the antigen.

• Korean Journal of Microbiology
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• v.33 no.1
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• pp.15-21
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• 1997

We studied the characteristics of extracellular autolysins from Moraxella sp. CK-1 which has been known to lyse the cyanobacterial cell walls. This bacterium excreted autolysins from the early exponential growth phase. These enzymes showed optimal action condition of 60-$70^{\circ}C$ and pH 9.0. Whereas $Na^{+}$, $K^{+}$ and $Li^{+}$ ions exhibited positive effect on the enzyme activity, $Ba^{2+}$, $Mg^{2+}$, $Ca^{2+}$ and $Mn^{2+}$ ions exhibited negative effect. Especially, $Fe^{2+}$ and $Cu^{2+}$ ions almost completely suppressed the activity. Four extracellular autolysins of 30, 32, 38 and 41 kDa were detected in renaturing SOS-PAGE gel containing 0.2% heat-killed Micrococcus luteus cells as substrate. Among these 4 autolysins, 2 enzymes of 32 and 41 kDa distributed in the culture medium throughout the experimental time, but the 38 kOa enzyme diminished and 30 kOa began to appear at mid-exponential growth phase. When SOS-insoluble peptidoglycan of M. luteus was treated with the autolysins of Moraxella sp. CK-l, the concentration of free amino groups in reaction mixture increased. This indicates that the autolysins are N-acetylmuramyl-L-alanine amidase or endopeptidase.

• Korean Journal of Microbiology
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• v.38 no.3
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• pp.205-212
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• 2002

This study was conducted to develop a method for direct determination of phagocytic activities in human circulatic systems and to measure the phagocytic activities in human leukocytes from the alcoholics, since phagocytic activity was considered to be very important in human immune mechanism at early stage for the health care of the alcoholics. The subjects for this study were 130 among which 95 males and 3 females were diagnosed as alcoholism and 32 was healthy blood donors. A thin layer of heat-killed Staphylococcus aureus Cowan I was placed on a plastic dish and reacted with whole blood to measure the phagocytic plaque formation by human leukocytes. In order to determine the health conditions of the subjects, some clinical laboratory tests, such as white blood cell counts, hemoglobin contents (Hgb), mean corpuscular volume of red blood cells(MCV), serum electrophoresis, B and T-lymphocytes, T-lymphocyte subtypes and phytohemagglutination test were also implemented. Compared to the non-alcoholism, new and old alcoholic inpatients showed statistically significant differences on levels of Hgb and MCV (p<0.05), but showed that T and B-lymphocyte numbers decreased and Helper T cell/Suppressor T cell ratio ($1.6{\pm}0.8$%) increased. Compared to non-alcoholism, phagocytic plaque activities of leukocytes from alcoholic patients decreased significantly and an unusual pattern in phagocytic plaque was observed, showing a strange body and chain shaped phagocytosis. Based upon these results, it is concluded that a phagocytic-plaques of Staphylococcus aureus Cowan I by leukocytes was very simple and useful method for the early immunological determination of phagocytic activities in alcoholic patients without requiring any special equipments.

• Tuberculosis and Respiratory Diseases
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• v.44 no.3
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• pp.470-478
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• 1997

Background : Phagocytosis is probably the first step for mycobacteria to be virulent in host because virulent strains are more readily phagocytosed by macrophage than attenuated strains. According to the traditional concept, multi-drug resistant strains have been regarded as less virulent. However, this concept has been challenged, since recent studies(reported) showed that the degree of virulence and drug-resistance is not related. The purpose of this study is to evaluate whether the phagocytic activity of M.tuberculosis by peripheral blood mononuclear cells(PBMC) is different according to drug-resistance or host factor. To evaluate this, we estimated the difference of phagocytic activity of drug-resistant and drug-sensitive M.tuberculosis and also estimated the phagocytic activity of PBMC from intractable tuberculosis patients and healthy controls. Methods : PBMC from ten intractable tuberculosis patients and twelve healthy control, and three different strains of heat-killed M.tuberculosis, ie, ADS(all drug sensitive), MDR(multi-drug resistant), and ADR(all drug resistant) were used. After incubation of various strains of M.tuberculosis with PBMC, the phagocytic activity was evaluated by estimating proportion of PBMC which have phagocytosed M.tuberculosis. Results : Drug-resistant strains of M.tuberculosis were phagocytosed easily than drug sensitive strains(Percentage of PBMC phagocytosed M.tuberculosis in healthy control : ADS : $32.3{\pm}2.9%$, ADR : $49.6{\pm}3.4%$, p = 0.0022, Percentage of PBMC phagocytosed M.tuberculosis in intractable tuberculosis patients : ADS : $34.9{\pm}3.6%$, ADR : $50.7{\pm}4.5%$, p = 0.0069). However, there was no difference in phagocytic activity of PBMC from healthy control and intractable tuberculosis patients. Conclusion : Drug-resistant strains of M.tuberculosis were phagocytosed easily than drug sensitive strains and host factors does not seems to influence the phagocytosis of M.tuberculosis.

• Journal of the Society of Cosmetic Scientists of Korea
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• v.36 no.1
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• pp.57-63
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• 2010

To develop natural therapeutic agents for acne vulgaris, we investigated antibacterial and anti-inflammatory effects of various medicinal plant extracts. Among candidate extracts, we selected Psoralea corylifolia L. extract (AC-1) and Magnoliae officinalis extract (AC-2) which showed the relatively high antibacterial effects, and Inula helenium L. extract (ACF-1) and Chrysanthemum zawadskii var. latilobum extract (ACF-2) which showed the relatively high anti-inflammatory effects for further investigations. All of them did not show cytotoxic effects below the concentration of $50{\mu}g/mL$. The antibacterial effects of AC-1, AC-2 and extract complex (AC) against P. acnes were 2.8, 2.5 and 3.2 times higher than that of 10 % salicylic acid respectively. And the antibacterial effect of AC-2 and extract complex against S. aureus were 1.4 and 1.5 times higher than that of 10 % methylparaben respectively. Also, it was shown that ACF-1, ACF-2 and extract complex had anti-inflammatory effects. All of them exhibited inhibitory effects for the secretion of IL-8 and TNF-$\alpha$ from THP-1 cells activated by heat-killed P. acnes. They reduced about 27 %, 38 %, 44 % of IL-8 secretion and 90 %, 88 %, 90 % of TNF-$\alpha$ secretion at concentration of $50{\mu}g/mL$ respectively. These results showed that the complex of medicinal plant extracts, AC-1. AC-2, ACF-1, and ACF-2, had therapeutic effects to acne vulgaris through antibacterial and anti-inflammatory effects. Therefore, we suggest that extract complex of AC-1, AC-2, ACF-1 and ACF-2 may be used as a useful agent for development of natural cosmetics which have therapeutic effects to acne vulgaris.