Bakkenolide A inhibits leukemia by regulation of HDAC3 and PI3K/Akt-related signaling pathways.

Leukemia has been the third type of cancer killing many people across the world. Bakkenolide A (Bak), extracted from Petasites tricholobus, has been suggested to against cancer and display protective effects on inflammatory cytokines formation. And increasing evidences suggest that histone deacetylase 3 (HDAC3) plays vital roles in cancer formation and persistence via cell death, apoptosis and inflammation. But the function of Bakkenolide A in regulating leukemia is not understood yet, particularly via HDAC3. Here, we found that HDAC3 is up-regulated in clinical samples of leukemia compared with adjacent normal tissues. Then the expression of HDAC3 was knocked down via RNA interference in K562 cells. And inhibition of HDAC3 expression is able to improve leukemia invasion, migration and proliferation. Further, we also found HDAC3 bound to IκBα, affecting subsequent inflammation response. Moreover, Bakkenolide A was found to inhibit inflammation, induce apoptosis and cell death in leukemia cells via PI3K-regulated signaling pathway, down-regulating IKKs expression and suppressing in proinflammatory cytokines of IL-1ß, IL-18 and TNF-α. Up-regulation of Caspase3/7 was observed in cells of HDAC3-knockdown and Bakkenolide A treatment, inducing leukemia cell apoptosis. Also, the expression of Akt and GSK were activated by HDAC3-knockdown and Bakkenolide A-treatment. Thus, these results indicated that Bakkenolide A-mediated HDAC3 sensitization in leukemia cells seem to be associated with activation of effector IKKs, Akt/GSK, and caspases through induction of the PI3K pathway, leading to inflammation, cell death, and apoptosis.

Shenfu injection attenuates neonatal hypoxic-ischemic brain damage in rat.

Perinatal hypoxia-ischemia remains the most important cause of brain injury in the newborn. However, there is still no effective cure for neonatal hypoxic-ischemic brain damage (HIBD). In the present study, we aimed to examine the neuroprotective effects of Shenfu injection (SFI) on HIBD of neonatal rat. Sprague-Dawley rats were divided randomly into three groups (n = 8): S group: the rats were sham operated; C group: the rats were operated for HIBD modeling and received intraperitoneal injection of saline; SFI group: the rats were operated for HIBD modeling and received intraperitoneal injection of SFI (10 ml/kg days) for 7 days. Flow cytometry analysis showed that apoptosis rate of neuron in hippocampal CAI region in SFI group was significantly less than in NC group at 3 and 7 days after HI insult (P < 0.05). Immunohistochemical staining demonstrated that Bcl-2 expression was markedly higher while Bax expression was significantly lower in SFI group than in the C group at 24, 72 h and 7 days after HI insult (P < 0.05). Our findings suggest that SFI exhibits neuroprotective effects for neonatal hypoxic-ischemic brain injury by preventing neuron apoptosis and has potential to be used in the clinical for the treatment of perinatal hypoxia-ischemia.