Xanthohumol impairs glucose uptake by a human first-trimester extravillous trophoblast cell line (HTR-8/SVneo cells) and impacts the process of placentation.

In this study, we aimed to investigate modulation of glucose uptake by the HTR-8/SVneo human first-trimester extravillous trophoblast cell line by a series of compounds and to study its consequences upon cell proliferation, viability and migration. We observed that uptake of (3)H-deoxy-d-glucose ((3)H-DG; 10 nM) was time-dependent, saturable, inhibited by cytochalasin B (50 and 100 µM), phloretin (0.5 mM) and phloridzin (1 mM), insulin-insensitive and sodium-independent. In the short term (30 min), neither 5-HT (100-1000 µM), melatonin (10 nM) nor the drugs of abuse ethanol (100 mM), nicotine (100 µM), cocaine (25 µM), amphetamine (10-25 µM) and 3,4-methylenedioxy-N-methamphetamine (10 µM) affected (3)H-DG uptake, while dexamethasone (100-1000 µM), fluoxetine (100-300 µM), quercetin, epigallocatechin-3-gallate (30-1000 µM), xanthohumol (XH) and resveratrol (1-500 µM) decreased it. XH was the most potent inhibitor [IC50 = 3.55 (1.37-9.20) µM] of (3)H-DG uptake, behaving as a non-competitive inhibitor of (3)H-DG uptake, both after short- and long-term (24 h) treatment. The effect of XH (5 µM; 24 h) upon (3)H-DG uptake involved mammalian target of rapamycin, tyrosine kinases and c-Jun N-terminal kinases intracellular pathways. Moreover, XH appeared to decrease cellular uptake of lactate due to inhibition of the monocarboxylate transporter 1. Additionally, XH (24 h; 5 µM) decreased cell viability, proliferation, culture growth and migration. The effects of XH upon cell viability and culture growth, but not the antimigratory effect, were mimicked by low extracellular glucose conditions and reversed by high extracellular glucose conditions. We thus suggest that XH, by inhibiting glucose cellular uptake and impairing HTR-8/SVneo cell viability and proliferation, may have a deleterious impact in the process of placentation.

Flow-injection spectrophotometric determination of bromate in bottled drinking water samples using chlorpromazine reagent and a liquid waveguide capillary cell.

In this work, aiming to develop a simple, inexpensive method for the determination of low bromate levels in water samples, a liquid waveguide capillary cell (LWCC) was coupled to a FIA system. The long optical path (100 cm) of the LWCC was used to improve the sensitivity and the limit of detection without resorting to any off-line or in-line preconcentration processes. The spectrophotometric determination was based on the oxidation of chlorpromazine by bromate in an acidic medium, resulting in the formation of a colored radical product. Sulfamic acid was added to the reagent for minimizing the interference of nitrite, and a chelating ion exchange resin was used to remove major cationic interferences. The developed system allowed the determination of bromate within the range between 1 - 20 µg L(-1) with a detection limit of 0.2 µg L(-1).