Chemical Constituents of Vigna luteola and Their Anti-inflammatory Bioactivity.

Seventy-three compounds were identified from the methanol extract of V. luteola, and among these, three new (1⁻3) were characterized by spectroscopic and mass spectrometric analyses. The isolated constituents were assessed for anti-inflammatory potential evaluation, and several purified principles exhibited significant superoxide anion and elastase inhibitory effects.

High-Content Assay Multiplexing for Muscle Toxicity Screening in Human-Induced Pluripotent Stem Cell-Derived Skeletal Myoblasts.

Skeletal muscle-associated toxicity is an underresearched area in the field of high-throughput toxicity screening; hence, the potential adverse effects of drugs and chemicals on skeletal muscle are largely unknown. Novel organotypic microphysiological in vitro models are being developed to replicate the contractile function of skeletal muscle; however, the throughput and a need for specialized equipment may limit the utility of these tissue chip models for screening. In addition, recent developments in stem cell biology have resulted in the generation of induced pluripotent stem cell (iPSC)-derived skeletal myoblasts that enable high-throughput in vitro screening. This study set out to develop a high-throughput multiplexed assay using iPSC-derived skeletal myoblasts that can be used as a first-pass screen to assess the potential for chemicals to affect skeletal muscle. We found that cytotoxicity and cytoskeletal integrity are most useful and reproducible assays for the skeletal myoblasts when evaluating overall cellular health or gauging disruptions in actin polymerization following 24 h of exposure. Both assays are based on high-content imaging and quantitative image processing to derive quantitative phenotypes. Both assays showed good to excellent assay robustness and reproducibility measured by interplate and interday replicability, coefficients of variation of negative controls, and Z'-factors for positive control chemicals. Concentration response assessment of muscle-related toxicants showed specificity of the observed effects compared to the general cytotoxicity. Overall, this study establishes a high-throughput multiplexed assay using skeletal myoblasts that may be used for screening and prioritization of chemicals for more complex tissue chip-based and in vivo evaluation.

Glaucumolides A and B, Biscembranoids with New Structural Type from a Cultured Soft Coral Sarcophyton glaucum.

Glaucumolides A (1) and B (2), novel biscembranes composed of an unprecedented α,ß-unsaturated ε-lactone, along with the known metabolites ximaolide A (3) and isosarcophytonolide D (4), were isolated from the cultured soft coral Sarcophyton glaucum. The structures of the new metabolites were determined by extensive spectroscopic analyses. Compounds 1 and 2 were shown to exhibit cytotoxicity against a limited panel of cancer cell lines. In anti-inflammation assay, compounds 1 and 2 displayed strong inhibition of superoxide anion generation and elastase release in human neutrophils stimulated by fMLP/CB. Furthermore, both 1 and 2 were shown to significantly inhibit the accumulation of the pro-inflammatory inducible nitric oxide synthase protein, and compounds 1-3 were found to effectively reduce the expression of cyclooxygenase-2 protein, in lipopolysaccharide-stimulated RAW264.7 macrophage cells.

[Proliferative activity parameters and their correlation with genetic damage of blood lymphocytes during cultivation under the conditions of cytokinetic block].

The subjects of the study were 15 volunteers aged 22 to 25 years, who underwent 25 air ionization sessions. The effects of genome instability were evaluated, and correlations between indicators of genome damage (lesions of micronuclei and nucleoplasmatic bridges) and parameters of proliferative and replicative activity (mitotic index, proliferative pool, the fraction of rapidly dividing cells, and replication index) of blood lymphocytes in the culture were studied. In order to establish the associations between the parameters, the parallel cultures were exposed to 0.07 mM of the standard mutagen MNNG during 5 hours. The study showed that the course of air ionization did not induce the micronuclei and nucleoplasmatic bridges in binuclear cells, but increased proliferative cell activity. This effect was accompanied by an increase in the fraction of rapidly dividing cells among all the dividing cells, and an increase in the dispersion of all proliferation parameters. MNNG induced a constant level of micronuclei in binuclear cells during the whole course, but not before the beginning of air ionization. The changes in the parameter "the fraction of dividing cells" (proliferative pool) were the most prominent manifestation of the suppression of proliferation by MNNG. MNNG loading inhibited the formation of binuclear cells most of all. The results demonstrate a non-random character of the correlation between the level of micronuclei in binuclear cells and proliferative activity parameters during cell cultivation under the conditions of cytokinetic block.

Aneugen-induced micronuclei (MN) in human lymphocytes may be discerned using image analysis techniques when cell-cycle stage is taken into account.

We show that for the in vitro cytochalasin-B human lymphocyte micronucleus (MN) test, the quantification of the DNA content of MN and the difference in DNA content between the two macronuclei in the binucleate cells without MN, as measured by image analysis, gives a first estimation of the aneugenic potential of a test compound. Cultures of isolated human lymphocytes were exposed either to gamma-rays as a clastogen or to carbendazim (MBC) as an aneugen. The lymphocytes were stained with Feulgen stain and the MN were analyzed for DNA content with a Magiscan 2A image analyzer. The mean DNA content of MN induced by MBC were statistically higher than gamma-irradiation-induced MN. It was demonstrated that in culture the lymphocytes, as well as the MN, are in different stages of the cell cycle, but this will not affect the discriminating power of the MN DNA content when only G1 cells are considered, or when DNA content of the MN is expressed relative to the total genome. The identification of G1 and G2 cell populations from image analysis data was performed by extrapolation of DNA content data from G1- and G2-sorted lymphocytes with a FacStar plus flow sorter. It was demonstrated that in MBC-treated cells the DNA rearrangement between the macronuclei in binucleates without MN was on the average higher than in gamma-irradiated and untreated cells, which points to aneugenic effects of MBC without the formation of MN. In contrast to DNA content measurements, the area of the MN is not a reliable measure for discriminating clastogens from aneugens.