Proliferation of mammalian cells with Chlorococcum littorale algal compounds without serum support.

In recent years, serum-free medium for mammalian cell cultivation has attracted a lot of attention, considering the high cost of production and environmental load involved in developing the conventional animal sera. The use of alternative growth-promoting products in mammalian cell cultivation such as extracts from microalgae has proven to be quite beneficial and environmental-friendly. This research aims to cultivate mammalian cells with growth-promoting factors derived from Chlorococcum littorale. We have established a simple extraction using the ultrasonication method and applied the extract in place of serum on mammalian C2C12 cell lines, 3T3 cell lines, and CHO cell lines to compare and analyze the effectiveness of the extract. Cell passage was conducted in a suspended culture condition with the addition of the extract. The results indicate that the extract from microalgae shows a high proliferation rate in all cell lines without fetal bovine serum. Moreover, it is eco-friendly and has huge potential to replace the traditional cell culture system. It could be applied in the fields of regenerative medicine, gene/cell therapies, as well as cultured meat production.

Integrative Approaches of Bioassay and Computational Analysis for Discovering Potential Bioactive Compounds and Predictive Toxicity.

Changes in eating habits are brought about by drastic changes in lifestyle and environment, and, it has been pointed out, are strongly involved in the increase in neurological diseases and onset of cancer in younger adult ages. There is a wide variety of chemical substances in food, and there is a need to analyze the effects of complex exposures on complex mechanisms of action and to develop methods for evaluating and predicting them. The power of molecular nutrition needs to create an integrated approach to human nutrition in line with the grand social challenges of diet-related illnesses. The current article aims to explore some of these areas where integration is appropriate. Therefore, in this symposium, we will introduce the contents of four performers who are conducting cutting-edge research. 1) Chemoprevention by vitamin A and its derivatives, 2) Toxicity prediction of natural compounds from a developing database of bioactive gradients from Kampo medicine, 3) Toxicity prediction of chemicals using pluripotent stem cells. 4) Detection of bioactive compounds in "Aji" or "Umami" in food. By detecting and predicting the biological activity and toxicity of chemical substances such as nutrients in foods, it will be possible to provide better molecular information on dietary components. In addition, we will introduce next-generation health and prevention methods.

Anti-malarial activity in a Chinese herbal supplement containing Inonotus obliquus and Panax notoginseng.

Plasmodium falciparum, the most virulent human malaria parasite, causes serious diseases among the infected patients in the world and is particularly important in African regions. Although artemisinin combination therapy is recommended by the WHO for treatment of P. falciparum-malaria, the emergence of artemisinin-resistant parasites has become a serious issue which underscores the importance of sustained efforts to obtain novel chemotherapeutic agents against malaria. As a part of such efforts, thirty-nine herbal extracts from traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) were assayed for their anti-malarial activity using 3D7 strain of P. falciparum. Three herbal supplements appeared to possess higher specific anti-malarial activity than the others. One of them (D3) was separated by two sequential fractionations with reverse-phase (the first step) and normal-phase (the second step) liquid chromatography, in which some fractions resulted in higher specific activities than those of D3 or the previous fractions. Cell toxicity assay was performed with the fractions of the first fractionation and demonstrated no obvious cell toxicity. These results suggest that structure determination of the major compound for the anti-malarial activity in D3 may help the development of more potent chemicals in the future.

A Soft Spot for Chemistry-Current Taxonomic and Evolutionary Implications of Sponge Secondary Metabolite Distribution.

Marine sponges are the most prolific marine sources for discovery of novel bioactive compounds. Sponge secondary metabolites are sought-after for their potential in pharmaceutical applications, and in the past, they were also used as taxonomic markers alongside the difficult and homoplasy-prone sponge morphology for species delineation (chemotaxonomy). The understanding of phylogenetic distribution and distinctiveness of metabolites to sponge lineages is pivotal to reveal pathways and evolution of compound production in sponges. This benefits the discovery rate and yield of bioprospecting for novel marine natural products by identifying lineages with high potential of being new sources of valuable sponge compounds. In this review, we summarize the current biochemical data on sponges and compare the metabolite distribution against a sponge phylogeny. We assess compound specificity to lineages, potential convergences, and suitability as diagnostic phylogenetic markers. Our study finds compound distribution corroborating current (molecular) phylogenetic hypotheses, which include yet unaccepted polyphyly of several demosponge orders and families. Likewise, several compounds and compound groups display a high degree of lineage specificity, which suggests homologous biosynthetic pathways among their taxa, which identifies yet unstudied species of this lineage as promising bioprospecting targets.