Limonoids from seeds of A. Juss. and their cytotoxic activity

Four new limonoid-type nortriterpenoids, 1-detigloyl-1--methacryloylsalannin (), 28-deoxo-2,3-dihydronimbolide (), 12-acetoxy-3--acetyl-7--tigloylvilasinin () and 12-acetoxy-3--acetyl-7--methacryloylvilasinin (), along with five known ones, were isolated from seeds of A. Juss. Their structures were elucidated by various spectroscopic methods, including UV, IR, MS, NMR, X-ray crystallography, quantum chemical calculation, as well as by comparison of their spectroscopic data with those reported. In the cytotoxic assay, showed inhibitory activity against human breast cancer MDA-MB-231 cell line with IC value of 7.68±1.74 μmol/L, and inhibited growth of human cervical cancer Hela cell line, melanoma A375 cell line and promyelocytic leukemia HL-60 cell line, with IC 12.00±2.08, 17.44±2.11, and 13.95±5.74 μmol/L, respectively.

Study progress on antitumor activities of artemisinin and its derivatives / 中国生化药物杂志

The antitumor activities of artemisinin and its derivatives has become a hot topic in recent years.Artemisinin and its derivatives have been reported to exert antitumor effects mainly by blocking the cell cycle, promoting tumor cell apoptosis, inhibiting angiogenesis and so on.Also, their influence on signaling pathways has attracted considerable interest of many scholars.Currently, in order to discover some compounds with better therapeutic potentials, many studies dedicated to the synthesis and development of new artemisinin derivatives.In addition, the effects of artemisinin and its derivatives on multi-drug resistantace in tumor cells also become a trend of the future research.In this paper, we review the research advances in the antitumor activities of artemisinin and its derivatives during the past five years to provide a reference for future study .

Connexin: a new perspective of tumor therapy / 中国生化药物杂志

Connexin (Cx) is the main component of gap junction channels, which is essential for intercellular communication between adjacent cells.Cx plays an important role in regulation of the growth, differentiation and apoptosis of cells and is closely related to tumor formation and development.The expression of Cx appears to be different in different stages of tumor development, and the regulatory mechanism of Cx is also involved in many aspects.In this paper, recent advances in the studies on Cx are reviewed, including the relationship between Cx and development of tumor, the basic mechanism of Cx, as well as its applications in antitumor-drug screening and tumor therapy.

Quantitative study of cytotoxic T-lymphocyte immunotherapy for nasopharyngeal carcinoma.

BACKGROUND: In clinical practice, the common strategy for immunotherapy of nasopharyngeal carcinoma (NPC) is to infuse cytotoxic T-lymphocyte (CTL) lines several times by intravenous injection, but it is difficult by laboratory research to investigate the relationship between treatment time-point, the amount of CTL added and the therapeutic effect. The objective of this study is to establish a mathematical model to study the therapeutic effect of different treatment time-points and amounts of CTL, and to predict the change in therapeutic effect when the percentage of EBV LMP2-specific CTL is increased from 10% to 20%. RESULTS: The concentration of epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR) in the tumor cell cytomembranes increases after CTL is added. Concurrently, there is a marked downward trend of the phosphorylated transforming growth factor-α (TGFα)-EGFR complex in the tumor cell cytomembranes, which indicates restriction of tumor growth after CTL immunotherapy. The relationships among the time of addition of CTL, the amount of CTL added, different CTL specificities for LMP2 and the increment rate k of the total number of tumor cells were evaluated. CONCLUSIONS: The simulation results quantify the relationships among treatment time-points, amount of CTL added, and the corresponding therapeutic effect of immunotherapy for NPC.

Hydrophobic organic chemicals (HOCs) removal from biologically treated landfill leachate by powder-activated carbon (PAC), granular-activated carbon (GAC) and biomimetic fat cell (BFC).

Biological pretreatment efficiently remove organic matter from landfill leachate, but further removal of refractory hydrophobic organic chemicals (HOCs) is hard even with advanced treatment. In this work, three-stage-aged refuse bioreactor (ARB) efficiently removed chemical oxygen demand (COD) and biochemical oxygen demand (BOD) of fresh leachate produced in Shanghai laogang landfill, from 8603 to 451 mg L(-1) and 1368 to 30 mg L(-1), respectively. In downstream treatment, 3 g L(-1) powder-activated carbon (PAC), granular-activated carbon (GAC) and biomimetic fat cell (BFC) removed 89.2, 73.4 and 81.1% HOCs, but only 24.6, 19.1 and 8.9% COD, respectively. Through the specific HOCs accumulation characteristics of BFC, about 11.2% HOCs with low molecular weight (<1000 Da) in the biologically treated leachate were concluded. Since HOCs are competitively trapped by dissolved organic matters (DOM), the ultimate removal of HOCs from leachate is unreachable by activated carbon or BFC. It was also found that the biologically treated leachate effluent exhibited a wide molecular weight distribution (34-514,646 Da). These constitutes are derived from both autochthonous and allochthonous matters as well as biological activities.

Antioxidative and cytotoxic properties of diarylheptanoids isolated from Zingiber officinale / 中国中药杂志

<p><b>OBJECTIVE</b>To investigate the antioxidant and cytotoxic properties of five diarylheptanoids (1-5) isolated from the rhizomes of Zingiber officinale.</p><p><b>METHOD</b>Various models such as scavenging superoxide anions and 1,1-diphenyl-2- picrylhydrazyl (DPPH) radicals, inhibiting lipid peroxidation, as well as protecting of rat pheochromocytoma (PC12) cells induced by hydrogen peroxide (H2O2) were employed to assay the antioxidative effects of the diarylheptanoids. The cytotoxicities of compounds 1-5 were measured with MTT assays.</p><p><b>RESULT</b>The test compounds (1-5) showed promising DPPH inhibitory activities, and compound 5 exhibited the strongest DPPH scavenging activity with an IC50 value of (22.6+/-2.4) micromol x L(-1). Compounds 1, 3 and 4 showed potential anti-peroxidative effects with inhibitory rates of (66.3+/-15.4)%, (68.7+/-15.8)% and (72.2+/-10.6)%, respectively, at 100 microg x mL(-1). It could be observed that compounds 1, 3 and 4 demonstrated significant neuroprotective activities in a dose-dependent manner. Moreover, compound 3 exhibited certain cytotoxicities against human chronic myelogenous leukemia cells (K562) and its adriamycin-resistant cells (K562/ADR) with IC50 values of (34.9+/-0.6), (50.6+/-23.5) micromol x L(-1), respectively.</p><p><b>CONCLUSION</b>In vitro results demonstrated that five diarylheptanoids (1-5) isolated from the roots of Z. officinale were capable of scavenging radicals, inhibiting lipid peroxidation and protecting PC12 cells against the insult by H2O2. Additionally, compound 3 could inhibit the growth of K562 and K562/ADR cells.</p>

Biomimetic fat cell (BFC) modification and for lindane removal from aqueous solution.

To improve the regeneration ability of biomimetic fat cell (BFC), an innovative agent for hydrophobic organic contaminants (HOCs) removal, BFC was modified through introducing 1, 3, 5-benzenetricarboxyl trichloride with trifunctional group and heterocyclic piperazine in this research. Modified biomimetic fat cell (MBFC) has a good lindane removal capacity close to that of BFC and powder activated carbon (PAC), and the lindane removal is 97.68, 96.65 and 98.36% with 7 mg/L lindane initial concentration, respectively. At the same time, 20 mg/L MBFC or PAC is sufficient for 10 microg/L lindane removal, and in 20-60 mg/L doses range the lindane removal by both MBFC and PAC can reach 99.0%; When the doses is below 10 mg/L, MBFC showed better lindane removal than PAC and MBFC even could reach 96.8% lindane removal in 5 mg/L dose. Lindane removal by MBFC could be held on 95% above in first 6-time reuse. Though the lindane removal by MBFC decreased with the reuse time increasing, MBFC still could remove 80 % lindane after 9 times regeneration. In contract with BFC, MBFC showed obvious advantage on the regeneration. The lindane removal mechanism by MBFC, similar with BFC, includes bioaccumulation by MBFC nucleolus-triolein and adsorption by MBFC membrane, and the bioaccumulation is the main way.

Biomimetic fat cell (BFC) preparation and for lindane removal from aqueous solution.

Fat tissue of organism can accumulate hydrophobic chemicals efficiently and the accumulation level has a positive correlation with fat quantity. In this work, based on this characteristic, an innovative agent, that is, biomimetic fat cell (BFC) has been synthesized with interfacial polymerization. BFC has a hydrophobic nucleolus-triolein and hydrophilic membrane-polyamide, through which water, carrying hydrophobic organic contaminants (HOCs), can pass. This process is followed by the accumulation of HOCs. BFC has 97.39% lindane removal ability. This is close to 98.12% lindane removal by powder active carbon (PAC) in aqueous solution and 7 mg/L initial concentration of lindane. BFC can be regenerated easily by organic solvent dialysis in comparison with high temperature or pressure used for PAC regeneration. Lindane removal by BFC may occur through two mechanisms: bioaccumulation by BFC nucleolus-triolein; and adsorption by BFC membrane. Bioaccumulation is the prevailing mechanism.

Primary study on HPLC fingerprint of cultured Cordyceps militaris / 中草药

Objective To establish the HPLC fingerprint of cultured Cordyceps militaris. MethodsHPLC Method was used for the determination of C. militaris on Agilent ZOBAX SB-Aq C18 column (250 mm?4.0 mm, 5 ?m), and measuring with methanol 5%—60% in 30 min as elution detective wavelength at 260 nm, injection sample of 1.0 ?L and flow rate of 1.0 mL/min. The systematic optimized design of the chromatographic conditions, such as supersonic extraction, mobile phase, and detective wavelength as well was carried out. Results Fingerprint consisted of 11 common peaks and the result of methodology determination fitted to the related standards. The evaluation of cultured C. militaris by systematically comparing chromatograms with a professional analytical software recommended by National Institute for the Control of Pharmaceutical and Biological Products has been established. Conclusion The method is accurate, simple, and useful for the quality control of cultured C. militaris.