Erratum: Lutein decreases oxidative stress and inflammation in liver and eyes of guinea pigs fed a hypercholesterolemic diet

This article was initially published on Nutrition Research and Practice with mistyped concentration of lutein used in the study.

Lutein decreases oxidative stress and inflammation in liver and eyes of guinea pigs fed a hypercholesterolemic diet

Guinea pigs were fed a hypercholesterolemic diet (0.25 g/100 g cholesterol) and randomly allocated either to a Control group (n = 9) or to a Lutein (0.1 g/100 g) group (n = 10) for 12 weeks to evaluate oxidative stress and inflammation in both liver and eyes. Malondialdehyde (MDA) concentrations and inflammatory cytokines were measured as well as hepatic nuclear factor-kappaB (NF-kappaB) binding. Lutein concentrations were greater in eyes (P < 0.01) and liver (P < 0.001) in the Lutein group. All guinea pigs had high concentrations of hepatic cholesterol as well as high plasma ALT and AST levels indicative of liver injury. However, the Lutein group had 43% lower hepatic free cholesterol than the Controls (P < 0.05). Hepatic MDA and MDA in the eye were lower in the Lutein compared to the Control group (P < 0.05). Hepatic tumor necrosis factor-alpha was 32% lower in the Lutein group (P < 0.05). Lastly, the Lutein group presented lower NF-kappaB DNA binding activity than the Control group (P < 0.001). These results suggest that in the presence of high cholesterol, lutein exerts both antioxidant and anti-inflammatory effects, which can be explained by attenuated NF-kappaB DNA binding activity. Furthermore, results also suggest that lutein accumulates in the eyes of guinea pigs to protect against oxidative stress.

Improvement of Ergone Production from Mycelial Culture of Polyporus umbellatus

Ergone,a fungal metabolite derived from ergosterol,was previously isolated and identified from Polyporus umbellatus. Ergone is a major component of P. umbellatus known to have anti-aldosteronic diuretic effect and also displays cytotoxic activities. Most of mushroom's fruit bodies used for test contained less than 10 microg/g of ergone. But P. umbellatus have larger amount of ergone than any other mushrooms. In order to improve the ergone production from the submerged culture of P. umbellatus, several factors including medium composition,culture conditions (temperature and pH) and different combinations of co-cultivation with various mycelia were studied. Among various carbon sources examined,starch proved to be most effective for the production of mycelia. The optimum pH and temperature for a flask culture of P. umbellatus mycelia were found to be 4.5 and 25degrees C,respectively. Under the optimized culture conditions,both the ergone production (86.9 microg/g) and mycelial growth (3.5 g/l) increased when P. umbellatus was cultured with Armillariella mellea. When the optimized conditions were applied,both mycelium and ergone production were significantly enhanced.