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The human colonic commensal enterotoxigenic Bacteroides fragilis (ETBF) is associated with chronic colitis and colon cancer. ETBF colonization induces colitis via the Bacteroides fragilis toxin (BFT). BFT secreted by ETBF cause colon inflammation via E-cadherin cleavage/NF-κB signaling. ETBF promotes colon tumorigenesis via interleukin 17A (IL-17A)/CXCL-dependent inflammation, but its bioactive therapeutics in ETBF-promoted tumorigenesis remain unexplored. In the current study, we investigated the caffeic acid phenethyl ester (CAPE) in the murine model of ETBF colitis and tumorigenesis. In this study, we observed that CAPE treatment mitigated inflammation induced by ETBF in mice. Additionally, our findings indicate that CAPE treatment offers protective effects against ETBF-enhanced colon tumorigenesis in a mouse model of colitis-associated colon cancer induced by azoxymethane (AOM) and dextran sulfate sodium. Notably, the decrease in colon tumorigenesis following CAPE administration correlates with a reduction in the expression of IL-17A and CXCL1 in the gastrointestinal tract. The molecular mechanism for CAPE-induced protection against ETBF-mediated tumorigenesis is mediated by IL-17A/CXCL1, and by NF-κB activity in intestinal epithelial cells. Our findings indicate that CAPE may serve as a preventive agent against the development of ETBF-induced colitis and colorectal cancer (CRC). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The high prevalence of methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) infection threatens the effectiveness of current clinical settings. Antimicrobial photodynamic therapy (APDT) is a promising alternative to antibiotics for treating infections due to its low resistance. This study aimed to evaluate the antibacterial properties of APDT with L. fischeri extract (LFE) against MRSA and various skin and oral pathogens in vitro and its photopharmaceutical actions in Caenorhabditis elegans. The antimicrobial activities of APDT with LFE against pathogens were evaluated using plate counting method. The chemical profile was characterized using high-performance liquid chromatography and spectrophotometry. The growth rate assay, lifespan assay, and bacterial attachment on worms were performed to assess the therapeutics effects in C. elegans. The swab method was used for the detection of pathogens on the micropig skin surface. The APDT treatment with L. fischeri extract (LFE, 20 µg/mL) and red light (intensity of 120 W/m2) reduced 4.3–4.9 log (colony forming unit/mL) of Staphylococcus aureus, MRSA, Cutibacterium acnes, Streptococcus mutans; and 2.4 log (CFU/mL) of Candida albicans. Chemical analysis revealed that LFE enriched three active photosensitizers. APDT reduced bacterial populations on worms, recovered growth retardation, and improved lifespan in MRSA-infected C. elegans without causing severe side effects. The surface eradication of MRSA after exposure to LFE with red light was demonstrated on micropig skin. These findings highlight the significance of L. fischeri as a natural resource for the safe phototreatment of MRSA infection in the biomedical and cosmeceutical industries. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Medically, photodynamic therapy (PDT) application is now extensively used, and PDT has been exploited to treat various oncological and non-oncological human diseases. 10.3390/biomedicines10020421 19 Fang J., Gao S., Islam R., Nema H., Yanagibashi R., Yoneda N., Watanabe N., Yasuda Y., Nuita N., Zhou J.-R. Styrene maleic acid copolymer-based micellar formation of temoporfin (SMA@ mTHPC) behaves as a nanoprobe for tumor-targeted photodynamic therapy with a superior safety. Pevna et al., measured the efficacy of hypericin-mediated PDT in U87 MG cells human GBM cells subjected to the treatment with rotenone that influence their metabolic activity. In 1903, Von Tappeiner and Jesionek [[1]] showed the efficacy of light treatment together with a photosensitizer and oxygen, which is so-called "photodynamic action". [Extracted from the article]

In recent decades, maternal age at first birth has increased, as has the risk of infertility due to rapidly declining oocyte quality with age. Therefore, an understanding of female reproductive aging and the development of potential modulators to control oocyte quality are required. In this study, we investigated the effects of 3,3′-diindolylmethane (DIM), a natural metabolite of indole-3-cabinol found in cruciferous vegetables, on fertility in a Caenorhabditis elegans model. C. elegans fed DIM showed decreased mitochondrial dysfunction, oxidative stress, and chromosomal aberrations in aged oocytes, and thus reduced embryonic lethality, suggesting that DIM, a dietary natural antioxidant, improves oocyte quality. Furthermore, DIM supplementation maintained germ cell apoptosis (GCA) and germ cell proliferation (GCP) in a CEP-1/p53-dependent manner in a reproductively aged C. elegans germ line. DIM-induced GCA was mediated by the CEP-1-EGL-1 pathway without HUS-1 activation, suggesting that DIM-induced GCA is different from DNA damage-induced GCA in the C. elegans germ line. Taken together, we propose that DIM supplementation delays the onset of reproductive aging by maintaining the levels of GCP and GCA and oocyte quality in a reproductively aged C. elegans. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In addition to synthetic and semisynthetic compounds, natural products have received much attention as prolific sources of lead compounds with therapeutic effects on various diseases. In the process of screening the bioactivities of potential candidates, an in vivo assay is very important for providing meaningful insight into the efficacy, adverse effects, and modes of action that are relevant to humans. Among the many experimental models, Caenorhabditis elegans is particularly efficient due to its advantages in morphology, behavior, and genetic aspects. This review summarizes some basic and useful techniques commonly used in screening the bioactivities of natural products. Recent studies of naturally occurring extracts as well as bioactive compounds in various areas, namely, anti-aging, anti-neurodegeneration, anti-obesity, anti-infection, and gut health, are reviewed as examples of the applicability of the C. elegans model. Technological developments that incorporate C. elegans in other fields, such as instrumental analysis and emerging methods, are also discussed in this paper. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objectives: To investigate the preventive effect of Lactobacillus casei HY2782 on toxicity induced by particulate matter (PM, inhalable particles less than 10 μm in diameter) in human intestinal CCD-18Co cells and a model animal Caenorhabditis elegans. Results: L. casei HY2782 treatment prevented PM-induced intestinal cell death via cellular reactive oxygen species production and membrane disruption attenuation. PM significantly decreased the total number of eggs laid and the body bending activity of C. elegans, demonstrating PM toxicity. L. casei HY2782 treatment restored the reproductive toxicity and decline in locomotion activity induced by PM in C. elegans. Overall, L. casei HY2782 attenuated PM toxicity in vitro in cultured intestinal cells and in vivo in the model nematode. Conclusion: Our study provides a potential clue for developing L. casei HY2782 probiotics that attenuate PM-induced cellular and physiological toxicity; however, further in-depth preclinical trials using mammalian animal models and clinical trials are required. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objectives: To develop a high-throughput screening system to measure the conversion of testosterone to dihydrotestosterone (DHT) in cultured human prostate cancer cells using turbulent flow chromatography liquid chromatography-triple quadrupole mass spectrometry (TFC-LC-TQMS).Results: After optimizing the cell reaction system, this method demonstrated a screening capability of 103 samples, including 78 single compounds and 25 extracts, in less than 12 h without manual sample preparation. Consequently, fucoxanthin, phenethyl caffeate, and Curcuma longa L. extract were validated as bioactive chemicals that inhibited DHT production in cultured DU145 cells. In addition, naringenin boosted DHT production in DU145 cells.Conclusion: The method can facilitate the discovery of bioactive chemicals that modulate the DHT production, and four phytochemicals are potential candidates of nutraceuticals to adjust DHT levels in male hormonal dysfunction. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Etoposide, a topoisomerase II inhibitor, has been widely used as a clinical anticancer drug to treat diverse cancer patients. Since not only rapidly dividing cancer cells but also the cells of normal human tissues and every living organism in environmental ecosystems have topoisomerases, it is crucial to study the toxicity of etoposide in other organisms in addition to cancer cells. In this study, we evaluated the toxicity of etoposide in both a soil nematode, Caenorhabditis elegans, and 3T3-L1 normal murine cells. Etoposide significantly retarded the growth, egg laying, and hatching in C. elegans. Etoposide also affected the reproductive gonad tissue, decreased the number of germ cells and induced abnormally enlarged nuclei in C. elegans. In addition, etoposide inhibited 3T3-L1 cell proliferation, with IC50 values of 37.8 ± 7.3 and 9.8 ± 1.8 μM after 24 and 48 hours of treatment, respectively, via the induction of cell cycle arrest at the G2/M phase and apoptotic cell death. Etoposide also induced nuclear enlargement in 3T3-L1 normal murine cells. The reproductive toxicity and abnormal nuclear morphological changes seemed to correlate with the adverse effects of etoposide. We suggest that these experimental platforms, i.e., the toxicological evaluation of both nematodes and 3T3-L1 cells, may be useful to study the mechanisms underlying the side effects of chemicals, including topoisomerase inhibitors. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Herein, we prepared standardized antioxidant-enriched fractions from red (AFR) and purple (AFP) colored potatoes and evaluated their protective effects against hepatotoxicity induced by oxidative stress. The major compound contained in both AFR and AFP was 5-caffeoylquinic acid. Experiments in vitro showed that AFR and AFP protected against HepG2 cell death induced by tert-butyl hydroperoxide ( t-BHP) as determined by cell viability assay. AFR and AFP recovered alanine aminotransferase (ALT) and aspartate aminotransferase (AST) enzyme activities, which increased by t-BHP treatment in HepG2 cells. AFR and AFP also inhibited the cleavage of PARP and caspase-3 in HepG2 cells. Moreover, in vivo experiments in mice showed that AFR and AFP protected against t-BHP-induced hepatotoxicity and recovered serum ALT and AST enzyme activities. AFR and AFP also rescued serum antioxidant enzyme activities, catalase and glutathione peroxidase, which were disturbed by t-BHP treatment. Our data clearly demonstrate that AFR and AFP protect against hepatic damage induced by oxidative stress. Practical Applications Colored potatoes contain plentiful amounts of antioxidant compounds that can be developed into dietary supplements for the improvement of human health. We prepared antioxidant-enriched fractions from red and purple colored potatoes (AFR and AFP, respectively) to be used as hepatoprotective agents. Based on chemical profiling analysis, we found that 5-caffeoylquinic acid can serve as a marker for the standardization of AFR and AFP as functional food materials. AFR and AFP strongly protected against oxidative stress and injury both in cultured hepatocytes and mice. AFR and AFP prevented the cell death of hepatocytes, and they also rescued hepatic damage markers ALT and AST both in cell and animal experiments. Generally, AFP showed higher hepatoprotective activity than AFR. Taken together, AFR and AFP may be promising candidates as functional foods for improving human liver function. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Nonvolatile magnetic RAM (MRAM) offers high cell density and low leakage power. This paper reports on using a 3-D integration technology based on through-silicon vias, to stack disparate memory technologies (e.g., SRAM and MRAM) together onto chip multiprocessors. In this paper, we explore the design of a 3-D stacked nonuniform hybrid SRAM/MRAM L2 cache architecture (NUCA) using the on-chip network to mitigate the interconnection problem. In addition, this paper investigates the problem of partitioning shared SRAM/MRAM hybrid L2 cache and placing cache data into the partitioned 3-D stacked hybrid NUCA for concurrently executing multiple applications in order to improve the system performance in terms of instructions per second while considering the heterogeneous characteristics in interconnection wire delay, memory cell density, memory access latency, and memory power consumption in a 3-D stacked hybrid SRAM/MRAM L2 cache. Experimental results show that the proposed runtime method with a 3-D stacked hybrid L2 cache improves performance by 61%, energy efficiency, i.e., energy-delay product by 53%, and storage lifetime by 15.6 times on average compared with the conventional SRAM-only L2 cache or MRAM-only L2 cache with the similar area. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Context: SomeLaunaeaspecies (Asteraceae) are used traditionally to treat liver oxidative stress. Objective: The present study investigates the protective effects of isolated compounds fromLaunaea spinosaSch. Bip. (Asteraceae) against oxidative stress ont-BHP-induced HepG2 cells. Materials and methods: Major phenolic content from flowering aerial parts ofL. spinosawas isolated and identified. The protective effects of isolated compounds (10 and 20 μM) against oxidative stress induced bytert-butyl hydroperoxide (t-BHP) in HepG2 cells were investigated through the measurement of aspartate aminotransferase (AST), alanine transaminase (ALT), and superoxide dismutase (SOD) levels. Results: A new phenolic compound identified as 2,3-diferulylR,R-(+) methyl tartrate (6), in addition to five known metabolites, esculetin (1), esculetin-7-O-d-glucoside (cichoriin) (2), fertaric acid (3), acacetin-7-O-d-glucoside (4), and acacetin-7-O-d-glucuronic acid (5), were isolated. Oxidant-induced damage by 200 μMt-BHP in HepG2 cells was inhibited by compounds1,4, and5(10 and 20 μM), or quercetin (10 μM; positive control). The protective effects of compounds1,4, and5were associated with decreasing in AST, ALT, and SOD levels. Compound4(20 μM) decreased the AST level from 128.5 ± 13.9 to 7.9 ±1.8 U/mL. Meanwhile, compound1(20 μM) decreased ALT activity from 20.3 ± 7.0 to 7.6 ± 2.4 U/mL, while compound5decreased SOD levels from 41.6 ± 9.0 to 28.3 ± 3.4 mU/mg. Conclusion:The major phenolic compounds isolated fromL. spinosadisplayed a significant cytoprotective effect against oxidative stress, leading to maintenance of the normal redox status of the cell. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

3-D integrated circuits (3-D ICs) offer a promising solution to overcome the scaling limitations of 2-D ICs. However, using too many through-silicon-vias (TSVs) pose a negative impact on 3-D ICs due to the large overhead of TSV (e.g., large footprint and low yield). In this paper, we propose a new TSV sharing method for a circuit-switched 3-D mesh-of-tree (MoT) interconnect, which supports high-throughput and low-latency communication between processing cores and 3-D stacked multibanked L2 scratchpad memory. The proposed method supports traffic balancing and TSV-failure tolerant routing. The proposed method advocates a modular design strategy to allow stacking multiple identical memory dies without the need for different masks for dies at different levels in the memory stack. We also investigate various parameters of 3-D memory stacking (e.g., fabrication technology, TSV bonding technique, number of memory tiers, and TSV sharing scheme) that affect interconnect latency, system performance, and fabrication cost. Compared to conventional MoT interconnect [6] that is straightforwardly adapted to 3-D integration, the proposed method yields up to $\times 2.11$ and $\times 1.11$ improvements in terms of cost efficiency (i.e., performance/cost) for microbump TSV bonding and direct Cu–Cu TSV bonding techniques, respectively. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Nonvolatile memory such as magnetic RAM (MRAM) offers high cell density and low leakage power while suffering from long write latency and high write energy, compared with SRAM. 3-D integration technology using through-silicon vias enables stacking disparate memory technologies (e.g., SRAM and MRAM) together onto chip-multiprocessors (CMPs). The use of hybrid memories as an on-chip cache can take advantage of the best characteristics that each technology offers. However, the inherent high power density and heat removal limitation in 3-D integrated circuits may incur temperature-related problems. In this paper, we propose a runtime thermal management method for CMPs with the 3-D stacked hybrid SRAM/MRAM L2 cache. The proposed method combines dynamic cache management such as resource allocation, way-based power gating, and data migration with dynamic voltage and frequency scaling of processing cores in a temperature- and energy-aware manner. Experimental results show that the proposed runtime method with the 3-D stacked hybrid L2 cache offers up to 107.37% (55.28% on average) performance improvement and 88.47% (47.65% on average) energy efficiency improvement compared with existing thermal management methods with 3-D stacked SRAM-based L2 cache. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Aceriphyllum rossii Engler (Saxifragaceae) has been used as a nutritious food in Korea, but only minimal studies on this plant have been undertaken. We have examined the estrogenic effect of A. rossii and have discovered its potent constituents. To identify the estrogenic activity of A. rossii, we measured the transactivation of the estrogen-responsive element (ERE) in MCF-7 cells transfected with an ERE-containing construct after treatment of the extract and fractions of A. rossii. A. rossii showed a potent estrogenic activity and gallic acid ethyl ester; quercetin and kaempferol were identified as major constituents of the active fractions by liquid chromatography-nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy/mass spectrometry. We confirmed quercetin and kaempferol are the major active constituents after activity-guided isolation of seven compounds: gallic acid ethyl ester (1), quercetin (2), kaempferol (3), quercetin-3- O-(6″-galloyl)-β- d-glucopyranoside (4), quercetin-3- O-β- d-glucopyranoside (5), kaempferol-3- O-(6″-galloyl)-β- d-glucopyranoside (6), and kaempferol-3- O-β- d-glucopyranoside (7). These results show A. rossii could be a possible candidate for the treatment of postmenopausal symptoms. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Handaeri-gomchi ( Ligularia fischeri var. spiciformis Nakai) (LF) is well known as a medicinal plant in Korea, especially to treat a variety of human disease including hepatic function failure. In this study, we examined the activity of LF extract against the liver injuries and oxidative stress by chronic alcohol in Spargue-Dawley rats. Severe liver damage caused by alcohol intake with increasing activity of hepatic markers was decreased in the group of rats fed LF extract. The results were confirmed through hematoxylin and eosin staining. Antioxidative capacity was decreased by alcohol but it was recovered by LF extract. Elevated indicators of oxidative stress by chronic alcohol were diminished in the group of LF extract. Furthermore, LF extracts increased antioxidative capacity and the activity of antioxidant enzymes. In conclusion, LF extract has a protective effect against chronic alcohol hepatotoxicity, suggesting it could be developed as a functional food or medicine for protection of liver disease. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Eisenia bicyclis (Kjellman) Setchell is a common brown alga that inhabits the middle Pacific coast around Korea and Japan. In this study, the ethanol extract and its serial solvent fractions were prepared from fresh E. bicyclis, and their hepatoprotective effects were investigated against hepatotoxicity in tert-butyl hyperoxide( t-BHP)-injured HepG2 cells. When these samples were used at a dose of 10-40 μg/mL, they significantly protected the t-BHP-induced cell death in HepG2 cells. Among fractions, ethyl acetate fraction (EF) and n-butanol extract (BF) exhibited potent hepatoprotective activities (62.60% for EF and 64.86% for BF) in t-BHP-injured HepG2 cells at a concentration of 10 μg/mL. To find the potential factors for this activity, the samples were characterized on total phenolics, chlorophylls, carotenoids, and radical scavenging activity. Among them, EF showed the highest content of total phenolics and the strongest antioxidant activity both in on- and offline assays. Five phlorotannin compounds, oligomers of phloroglucinol, were isolated chromatographically from this fraction and structurally identified by H-NMR and liquid chromatography-electrospray ionization-mass spectrometry analyses as eckol( 1), 6,6′-bieckol( 2), 8,8′-bieckol( 3), dieckol( 4), and phlorofucofuroeckol A( 5). Compound 5 among five purified compounds showed the strongest protective activity (45.54%) at a concentration of 10 μM. At the high dose (40 μM), the protective activities of three compounds (compound 2, 4, and 5) were higher than that of quercetin treated with 10 μM concentration. Therefore, we can speculate that they can be developed as potential candidates for natural hepatoprotective agents. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

3-D integration is a new technology that overcomes the limitations of 2-D integrated circuits, e.g., power and delay induced from long interconnect wires, by stacking multiple dies to increase logic integration density. However, chip-level power and peak temperature are the major performance limiters in 3-D multi-core architectures. In this paper, we propose a runtime power management method for both peak power and temperature-constrained 3-D multi-core systems in order to maximize the instruction throughput. The proposed method exploits dynamic temperature slack (defined as peak temperature constraint minus current temperature) and workload characteristics (e.g., instructions per cycle and memory-boundness) as well as thermal characteristics of 3-D stacking architectures. Compared with existing thermal-aware power management solutions for 3-D multi-core systems, our method yields up to 34.2% (average 18.5%) performance improvement in terms of instructions per second without significant additional energy consumption. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The aim of this study was to examine the estrogenic effect of a Korean wild vegetable, Disporum uniflorum Baker. The ethanolic extract from D. uniflorum (DUE) showed a potent estrogenic activity in MCF-7 cells. After the bioassay-guided fractionation from DUE, the ethyl acetate fraction (DUF) was discovered as the active fraction responsible for the estrogenic activity. Luteolin was one of major active components of DUF, and it could be considered as a marker compound for standardization of the activity. Both DUE and DUF induced the transactivation of estrogen response element (ERE) and cell proliferation in MCF-7 cells. DUF also exerted the estrogen signaling via the phosphorylations of estrogen receptor (ER) α at Ser and extracellular signal-regulated kinase 1/2 (ERK1/2). Based on this study, therefore, DUE and DUF could be potential candidates of functional food materials for the prevention and alleviation of postmenopausal symptoms. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Sulbutiamine is a highly lipid soluble synthetic analogue of vitamin B and is used clinically for the treatment of asthenia. The aim of our study was to demonstrate whether sulbutiamine is able to attenuate trophic factor deprivation induced cell death to transformed retinal ganglion cells (RGC-5). Cells were subjected to serum deprivation for defined periods and sulbutiamine at different concentrations was added to the cultures. Various procedures (e.g. cell viability assays, apoptosis assay, reactive oxygen species analysis, Western blot analysis, flow cytometric analysis, glutathione (GSH) and glutathione-S-transferase (GST) measurement) were used to demonstrate the effect of sulbutiamine. Sulbutiamine dose-dependently attenuated apoptotic cell death induced by serum deprivation and stimulated GSH and GST activity. Moreover, sulbutiamine decreased the expression of cleaved caspase-3 and AIF. This study demonstrates for the first time that sulbutiamine is able to attenuate trophic factor deprivation induced apoptotic cell death in neuronal cells in culture. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Health problems and reduced treatment effectiveness due to antimicrobial resistance have become important global problems and are important factors that negatively affect life expectancy. Antimicrobial photodynamic therapy (APDT) is constantly evolving and can minimize this antimicrobial resistance problem. Reactive oxygen species produced when nontoxic photosensitizers are exposed to light are the main functional components of APDT responsible for microbial destruction; therefore, APDT has a broad spectrum of target pathogens, such as bacteria, fungi, and viruses. Various photosensitizers, including natural extracts, compounds, and their synthetic derivatives, are being investigated. The main limitations, such as weak antimicrobial activity against Gram-negative bacteria, solubility, specificity, and cost, encourage the exploration of new photosensitizer candidates. Many additional methods, such as cell surface engineering, cotreatment with membrane-damaging agents, nanotechnology, computational simulation, and sonodynamic therapy, are also being investigated to develop novel APDT methods with improved properties. In this review, we summarize APDT research, focusing on natural photosensitizers used in in vitro and in vivo experimental models. In addition, we describe the limitations observed for natural photosensitizers and the methods developed to counter those limitations with emerging technologies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Bacterial antibiotic resistance is an alarming global issue that requires alternative antimicrobial methods to which there is no resistance. Antimicrobial photodynamic therapy (APDT) is a well-known method to combat this problem for many pathogens, especially Gram-positive bacteria and fungi. Hypericin and orange light APDT efficiently kill Staphylococcus aureus, methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA), and the yeast Candida albicans. Although Gram-positive bacteria and many fungi are readily killed with APDT, Gram-negative bacteria are difficult to kill due to their different cell wall structures. Pseudomonas aeruginosa is one of the most important opportunistic, life-threatening Gram-negative pathogens. However, it cannot be killed successfully by hypericin and orange light APDT. P. aeruginosa is ampicillin resistant, but we hypothesized that ampicillin could still damage the cell wall, which can promote photosensitizer uptake into Gram-negative cells. Using hypericin and ampicillin cotreatment followed by orange light, a significant reduction (3.4 log) in P. aeruginosa PAO1 was achieved. P. aeruginosa PAO1 inactivation and gut permeability improvement by APDT were successfully shown in a Caenorhabditis elegans model. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Fucoxanthin (FX), a marine carotenoid found in macroalgae and microalgae, exhibits several beneficial effects to health. The anti-obesity activity of FX is well documented, but FX has not been mass-produced or applied extensively or commercially because of limited availability of raw materials and complex extraction techniques. In this study, we investigated the anti-obesity effect of standardized FX powder (Phaeodactylum extract (PE)) developed from microalga Phaeodactylum tricornutum as a commercial functional food. The effects of PE on adipogenesis inhibition in 3T3-L1 adipocytes and anti-obesity in high-fat diet (HFD)-fed C57BL/6J mice were evaluated. PE and FX dose-dependently decreased intracellular lipid contents in adipocytes without cytotoxicity. In HFD-fed obese mice, PE supplementation for six weeks decreased body weight, organ weight, and adipocyte size. In the serum parameter analysis, the PE-treated groups showed attenuation of lipid metabolism dysfunction and liver damage induced by HFD. In the liver, uncoupling protein-1 (UCP1) upregulation and peroxisome proliferator activated receptor γ (PPARγ) downregulation were detected in the PE-treated groups. Additionally, micro computed tomography revealed lower fat accumulation in PE-treated groups compared to that in the HFD group. These results indicate that PE exerts anti-obesity effects by inhibiting adipocytic lipogenesis, inducing fat mass reduction and decreasing intracellular lipid content, adipocyte size, and adipose weight. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The cover image, by So Young Lee et al., is based on the Research Article Toxicological evaluation of the topoisomerase inhibitor, etoposide, in the model animal Caenorhabditis elegans and 3T3‐L1 normal murine cells, DOI 10.1002/tox.22406. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The transcription factor GATA-2, a key regulator of adipocyte differentiation, is expressed in adipocyte precursors, and directly suppresses peroxisome proliferator-activated receptor γ (PPAR γ). Constitutive expression of GATA-2 is known to hold the cells in undifferentiated state. Hence, GATA-2 activators could be good candidates for anti-obesity agents. A prenyl flavanone, 5-methylsophoraflavanone B (5-MSF) was isolated from a Mongolian medicinal plant Sophora flavescens Soland. To evaluate the inhibitory activity of 5-MSF on adipocyte differentiation, we induced differentiation of 3T3-L1 cells in the presence of 5-MSF. 5-MSF evidently inhibited adipocyte differentiation at 100 μM, which was confirmed by a microscopic observation and a quantification of lipid droplets after Oil Red O staining. Further molecular study revealed that 100 μM of 5-MSF slightly increased the protein expression of GATA-2 over the vehicle control in undifferentiated 3T3-L1 cells, while it decreased the protein expression of PPAR γ in mature 3T3-L1 cells concurrently. In conclusion, 5-MSF inhibited adipocyte differentiation through the activation of the GATA-2, and therefore it could be developed as a potential anti-obesity agent. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]