Bioprospecting of Turbinaria Macroalgae as a Potential Source of Health Protective Compounds.

The present study aims to focus on the bioprospecting of marine macroalgae of Turbinaria species, plenteous biomass of the world ocean. Three types of solvents, i.e., H2 O, MeOH/H2 O (80:20, v/v) and hexane/i-PrOH (50:50, v/v), were used for extraction. Both the biological activity and the pattern of present chemicals were characterized. For the cell proliferation assay, the human embryonic kidney 293 cells, cervix/breast/pancreatic adenocarcinoma, and osteosarcoma cells were used. For the antioxidant activity determination, both intracellular assay with human embryonic kidney and cervix adenocarcinoma cells, as well as the biochemical DPPH test, were employed. To complete the information about macroalgae composition, organic compounds were characterized by the liquid chromatography coupled with high resolution tandem mass spectrometry. Attention was concentrated mainly on the lipidomic profile characterization. In spite the fact that any significant antiproliferative effect was not observed for cancer cells, both the Turbinaria species were shown to be good protectors against the oxidative stress of the non-cancer cells. Most of the antioxidants were determined in the hexane/i-PrOH extract. As regards the lipids identified, most of them belonged to the triacylglycerols followed by sphingomyelins, diacylglycerols, and polar (lyso)phospholipids. Additionally to fatty acids with 14, 16 and 18 carbons, also those with odd carbon numbers were frequently present.

Study of Cytotoxic Effects of Benzonitrile Pesticides.

The benzonitrile herbicides bromoxynil, chloroxynil, dichlobenil, and ioxynil have been used actively worldwide to control weeds in agriculture since 1970s. Even though dichlobenil is prohibited in EU since 2008, studies addressing the fate of benzonitrile herbicides in the environment show that some metabolites of these herbicides are very persistent. We tested the cytotoxic effects of benzonitrile herbicides and their microbial metabolites using two human cell lines, Hep G2 and HEK293T, representing liver and kidneys as potential target organs in humans. The cell viability and proliferation were determined by MTT test and RTCA DP Analyzer system, respectively. The latter allows real-time monitoring of the effect of added substances. As the cytotoxic compounds could compromise cell membrane integrity, the lactate dehydrogenase test was performed as well. We observed high toxic effects of bromoxynil, chloroxynil, and ioxynil on both tested cell lines. In contrast, we determined only low inhibition of cell growth in presence of dichlobenil and microbial metabolites originating from the tested herbicides.