• Natural Product Sciences
• /
• v.23 no.4
• /
• pp.247-252
• /
• 2017

The methylglyoxal (MGO) trapping constituents from onion (Allium cepa L.) peels were investigated using pre-column incubation of MGO and crude extract followed by HPLC analysis. The peak areas of MGO trapping compounds decreased, and their chemical structures were identified by HPLC-ESI/MS. Among major constituents in outer scale of onion, 2-(3,4-dihydroxybenzoyl)-2,4,6-trihydroxy-3(2H)-benzofuranone (2) was more effective MGO scavenger than quercetin (6) and its 4'-glucoside, spiraeoside (3). After 1 h incubation, compound 2 trapped over 90% MGO at a concentration of 0.5 mM under physiological conditions, but compounds 3 and 6 scavenged 45%, 16% MGO, respectively. HPLC-ESI/MS showed that compound 2 trapped two molecules of MGO to form a di-MGO adduct and compounds 3 and 6 captured one molecule of MGO to form mono-MGO adducts, and the positions 6 and 8 of the A ring of flavonoids were major active sites for trapping MGO.

• Journal of Microbiology and Biotechnology
• /
• v.21 no.3
• /
• pp.277-283
• /
• 2011

Glyoxalase I catalyzes the conversion of methylglyoxal to S-D-lactoylglutathione in the presence of glutathione. The structural gene of glyoxalase I (GLO1) was cloned from an osmotolerant yeast, Candida magnoliae, which produces a functional sweetener, erythritol, from sucrose. DNA sequence analysis revealed that the uninterrupted open reading frame (ORF) of C. magnoliae GLO1 (CmGLO1) spans 945 bp, corresponding to 315 amino acid residues, and shares 45.2% amino acid sequence identity to Saccharomyces cerevisiae Glo1. The cloned ORF in a multicopy constitutive expression plasmid complemented the glo1 mutation of S. cerevisiae, confirming that it encodes Glo1 in C. magnoliae. The responses of CmGLO1 to environmental stresses were different from those of S. cerevisiae, which only responds to osmotic stress. An enzyme activity assay and reverse transcription polymerase chain reaction revealed that the expression of CmGLO1 is induced by stress inducers such as methylglyoxal, $H_2O_2$, KCl, and NaCl. The GenBank Accession No. for CmGLO1 is HM000001.

• Biomolecules & Therapeutics
• /
• v.25 no.2
• /
• pp.158-164
• /
• 2017

Methylglyoxal (MGO) is a highly reactive metabolite of glucose which is known to cause damage and induce apoptosis in endothelial cells. Endothelial cell damage is implicated in the progression of diabetes-associated complications and atherosclerosis. Hypericin, a naphthodianthrone isolated from Hypericum perforatum L. (St. John's Wort), is a potent and selective inhibitor of protein kinase C and is reported to reduce neuropathic pain. In this work, we investigated the protective effect of hypericin on MGO-induced apoptosis in human umbilical vein endothelial cells (HUVECs). Hypericin showed significant anti-apoptotic activity in MGO-treated HUVECs. Pretreatment with hypericin significantly inhibited MGO-induced changes in cell morphology, cell death, and production of intracellular reactive oxygen species. Hypericin prevented MGO-induced apoptosis in HUVECs by increasing Bcl-2 expression and decreasing Bax expression. MGO was found to activate mitogen-activated protein kinases (MAPKs). Pretreatment with hypericin strongly inhibited the activation of MAPKs, including P38, JNK, and ERK1/2. Interestingly, hypericin also inhibited the formation of AGEs. These findings suggest that hypericin may be an effective regulator of MGO-induced apoptosis. In conclusion, hypericin downregulated the formation of AGEs and ameliorated MGO-induced dysfunction in human endothelial cells.

• Biomolecules & Therapeutics
• /
• v.30 no.1
• /
• pp.28-37
• /
• 2022

Treatment options for patients with chronic kidney disease (CKD) are currently limited; therefore, there has been significant interest in applying mesenchymal stem/stromal cell (MSC)-based therapy to treat CKD. However, MSCs harvested from CKD patients tend to show diminished viability and proliferation due to sustained exposure to uremic toxins in the CKD environment, which limits their utility for cell therapy. The application of melatonin has been demonstrated to improve the therapeutic efficacy of MSCs derived from and engrafted to tissues in patients suffering from CKD, although the underlying biological mechanism has not been elucidated. In this study, we observed overexpression of hexokinase-2 (HK2) in serum samples of CKD patients and MSCs harvested from an adenine-fed CKD mouse model (CKD-mMSCs). HK2 upregulation led to increased production levels of methylglyoxal (MG), a toxic metabolic intermediate of abnormal glycolytic processes. The overabundance of HK2 and MG was associated with impaired mitochondrial function and low cell proliferation in CKD-mMSCs. Melatonin treatment inhibited the increases in HK2 and MG levels, and further improved mitochondrial function, glycolytic metabolism, and cell proliferation. Our findings suggest that identifying and characterizing metabolic regulators such as HK2 in CKD may improve the efficacy of MSCs for treating CKD and other kidney disorders.

• Journal of Korean Society of Environmental Engineers
• /
• v.31 no.11
• /
• pp.989-996
• /
• 2009

In this study, the effects of biofilter media type (three different activated carbons and anthracite), empty bed contact time (EBCT) and temperature on the removal of four aldehyde species (formaldehyde, acetaldehyde, glyoxal and methylglyoxal) in BAC filters were investigated. Experiments were conducted at three water temperature (5, 15 and $25^{\circ}C$) and four EBCTs (5, 10, 15, and 20 min). The experimental results indicated that the coal based BAC retained more bacterial biomass on the surface of the activated carbon than the other BACs, and increasing EBCT or increasing water temperature also increased the four aldehyde species removal in BAC filters. To achieve above 80% of removal efficiency for four aldehyde species in a BAC filter, above 15 min EBCT at $5^{\circ}C$ and 10 min EBCT at above $15^{\circ}C$ were required. The kinetic analysis indicated a first-order reaction rate for the biodegradation of four aldehyde species at various water temperatures. Data obtained from the BAC filters at various temperatures were also used to evaluate pseudo first-order rate constants for four aldehyde species. The half-lives evaluated for formaldehyde, acetaldehyde, glyoxal and methylglyoxal in the coal-based BAC ranging from 0.89 to 3.19 min, from 0.75 to 3.35 min, from 2.16 to 4.72 min and from 1.49 to 3.86 min, respectively, could be used to assist water utilities in designing and operating BAC filters.

• Proceedings of the Zoological Society Korea Conference
• /
• 1998.10b
• /
• pp.162.2-162
• /
• 1998

No Abstract, See Full Text

• Bulletin of the Korean Chemical Society
• /
• v.26 no.1
• /
• pp.178-180
• /
• 2005

• Biomolecules & Therapeutics
• /
• v.5 no.3
• /
• pp.265-271
• /
• 1997

Since the advent of chemotherapy, certain types of cancer have been particularly resistant to chemotherapeutic treatment. One of the most well-studied types of resistance is resistance to multiple struc-turally dissimialr hydrophobic chemotherapeutic agents, or multidrug resistance (MDR). We found that MDR cells (KBV20C, KB7D) being highly resistant to colchicine, etoposide, and vincristine were found to have very low level of putrescine and low level of spermidine than the drug sensitive parental cells (KB) but they had almost same level of spermine as the drug sensitive cells. Although both MDR and drug sensitive cells had almost same rate of polyamine uptake, MDR cells were much more sensitive to an inhibitor of polyamine synthesis, methylglyoxal-bis guanylhydrazone (MGBG), suggesting that MDR cells might be defective in polyamine synthesis. These results also suggest that HGBG can be used for treatment of MDR in vivo.

• BMB Reports
• /
• v.29 no.4
• /
• pp.294-299
• /
• 1996

Glyoxalase I (Ee 4.4.1.5, lactoylglutathione lyase) from Chlamydomonas reinhardtii was purified to homogeneity by ammonium sulfate fractionation, anion-exchange chromatography, hydrophobic interaction chromatography, and affinity chromatography on S-hexylglutathione agarose. The purified enzyme was judged to be homogeneous on SDS-PAGE, and consisted of a single polypeptide chain with a relative molecular weight of 24,000. The enzyme was most active at $40^{\circ}C$ and pH 7.5. It was catalytically most active with methylglyoxal as substrate. A number of properties of the Chlamydomonas glyoxalase I enzyme, such as substrate specificity, molecular mass, kinetic parameters, pi, metal ion effect, have been determined and compared with those reported for preparations from other sources. It had somewhat different characteristics from mammalian enzymes.

• Proceedings of the Microbiological Society of Korea Conference
• /
• 2005.05a
• /
• pp.217.1-217
• /
• 2005