Breast-to-brain metastasis is exacerbated with chemotherapy through blood-cerebrospinal fluid barrier and induces Alzheimer's-like pathology.

Control of breast-to-brain metastasis remains an urgent unmet clinical need. While chemotherapies are essential in reducing systemic tumor burden, they have been shown to promote non-brain metastatic invasiveness and drug-driven neurocognitive deficits through the formation of neurofibrillary tangles (NFT), independently. Now, in this study, we investigated the effect of chemotherapy on brain metastatic progression and promoting tumor-mediated NFT. Results show chemotherapies increase brain-barrier permeability and facilitate enhanced tumor infiltration, particularly through the blood-cerebrospinal fluid barrier (BCSFB). This is attributed to increased expression of matrix metalloproteinase 9 (MMP9) which, in turn, mediates loss of Claudin-6 within the choroid plexus cells of the BCSFB. Importantly, increased MMP9 activity in the choroid epithelium following chemotherapy results in cleavage and release of Tau from breast cancer cells. This cleaved Tau forms tumor-derived NFT that further destabilize the BCSFB. Our results underline for the first time the importance of the BCSFB as a vulnerable point of entry for brain-seeking tumor cells post-chemotherapy and indicate that tumor cells themselves contribute to Alzheimer's-like tauopathy.

SRA880, in vitro characterization of the first non-peptide somatostatin sst(1) receptor antagonist.

This report describes the in vitro features of the first somatostatin sst(1) receptor selective non-peptide antagonist, SRA880 ([3R,4aR,10aR]-1,2,3,4,4a,5,10,10a-Octahydro-6-methoxy-1-methyl-benz[g] quinoline-3-carboxylic-acid-4-(4-nitro-phenyl)-piperazine-amide, hydrogen malonate). SRA was evaluated in a number of in vitro systems of various species, both at native and recombinant receptors, using radioligand binding and second messenger/transduction studies. SRA880 has high affinity for native rat, mouse, monkey and human cerebral cortex somatostatin sst(1) receptors (pK(d) = 7.8-8.6) and for human recombinant sst(1) receptors (pK(d) = 8.0-8.1). SRA880 displayed significantly lower affinity for the other human recombinant somatostatin receptors ( pK(d) < or = 6.0) or a wide range of neurotransmitter receptors, except for the human dopamine D4 receptors. SRA880 was characterized in various transduction assays: somatotropin release inhibiting factor (SRIF) induced inhibition of forskolin-stimulated cAMP accumulation, SRIF stimulated-GTPgammaS binding, and SRIF stimulated luciferase gene expression; in all tests, SRA880 was devoid of intrinsic activity and acted as an apparently surmountable antagonist with pK(B) values of 7.5-7.7. Combined with the data from binding studies, these results suggest that SRA880 acts as a competitive antagonist. Thus, SRA880 is the first non-peptide somatostatin sst(1) receptor antagonist to be reported; SRA880 will be a useful tool for the characterization of somatostatin sst(1) receptor-mediated effects both in vitro and in vivo.

Rapid HPLC screening method for contaminants found in implicated L-tryptophan associated with eosinophilia myalgia syndrome and adulterated rapeseed oil associated with toxic oil syndrome.

In 1981 a massive food-borne epidemic, termed the toxic oil syndrome (TOS), occurred in Spain. Eight years later a closely related disease, the eosinophilia myalgia syndrome (EMS), was reported in the USA with many additional cases being reported worldwide. Although EMS was linked to the ingestion of contaminated L-tryptophan and TOS to aniline denatured rapeseed oil, the etiological agent(s) responsible for both diseases remains unknown. However, contaminants in both the oil and the dietary supplement are believed to have triggered these diseases, and there has been much speculation that a common contaminant may have caused both epidemics. In this report, methods for the facile preparation and HPLC analysis of EMS-implicated L-tryptophan and adulterated rapeseed oil samples associated with TOS are described which allow a direct comparison between the contaminants of both foodstuffs. A combination of solvent and solid phase extraction methods are demonstrated along with the application of C18 reversed-phase high-performance liquid chromatography (RP-HPLC) coupled with on-line UV and MS detection. These methods have allowed us to determine for the first time, based upon this work, that there are no detectable common contaminants that possess a UV response, between EMS implicated L-tryptophan and TOS implicated rapeseed oil samples.