Investigating the effect of poly-l-lactic acid nanoparticles carrying hypericin on the flow-biased diffusive motion of HeLa cell organelles

Hypericin: A natural anthraquinone as promising therapeutic agent

BACKGROUND

Hypericin is a prominent secondary metabolite mainly existing in genus Hypericum. It has become a research focus for a quiet long time owing to its extensively pharmacological activities especially the anti-cancer, anti-bacterial, anti-viral and neuroprotective effects. This review concentrated on summarizing and analyzing the existing studies of hypericin in a comprehensive perspective.

METHODS

The literature with desired information about hypericin published after 2010 was gained from electronic databases including PubMed, SciFinder, Science Direct, Web of Science, China National Knowledge Infrastructure databases and Wan Fang DATA.

RESULTS

According to extensive preclinical and clinical studies conducted on the hypericin, an organized and comprehensive summary of the natural and artificial sources, strategies for improving the bioactivities, pharmacological activities, drug combination of hypericin was presented to explore the future therapeutic potential of this active compound.

CONCLUSIONS

Overall, this review offered a theoretical guidance for the follow-up research of hypericin. However, the pharmacological mechanisms, pharmacokinetics and structure activity relationship of hypericin should be further studied in future research.

Multifunctional Nanoplatforms as a Novel Effective Approach in Photodynamic Therapy and Chemotherapy, to Overcome Multidrug Resistance in Cancer

It is more than sixty years since the era of modern photodynamic therapy (PDT) for cancer began. Enhanced selectivity for malignant cells with a reduced selectivity for non-malignant cells and good biocompatibility along with the limited occurrence of side effects are considered to be the most significant advantages of PDT in comparison with conventional therapeutic approaches, e.g., chemotherapy. The phenomenon of multidrug resistance, which is associated with drug efflux transporters, was originally identified in relation to the application of chemotherapy. Unfortunately, over the last thirty years, numerous papers have shown that many photosensitizers are the substrates of efflux transporters, significantly restricting the effectiveness of PDT. The concept of a dynamic nanoplatform offers a possible solution to minimize the multidrug resistance effect in cells affected by PDT. Indeed, recent findings have shown that the utilization of nanoparticles could significantly enhance the therapeutic efficacy of PDT. Additionally, multifunctional nanoplatforms could induce the synergistic effect of combined treatment regimens, such as PDT with chemotherapy. Moreover, the surface modifications that are associated with nanoparticle functionalization significantly improve the target potential of PDT or chemo-PDT in multidrug resistant and cancer stem cells.

Selective photodynamic effects on cervical cancer cells provided by P123 Pluronic®-based nanoparticles modulating hypericin delivery

At present, cervical cancer is the fourth leading cause of cancer among women worldwide with no effective treatment options. In this study we aimed to evaluate the efficacy of hypericin (HYP) encapsulated on Pluronic® P123 (HYP/P123) photodynamic therapy (PDT) in a comprehensive panel of human cervical cancer-derived cell lines, including HeLa (HPV 18-positive), SiHa (HPV 16-positive), CaSki (HPV 16 and 18-positive), and C33A (HPV-negative), compared to a nontumorigenic human epithelial cell line (HaCaT). Were investigated: (i) cell cytotoxicity and phototoxicity, cellular uptake and subcellular distribution; (ii) cell death pathway and cellular oxidative stress; (iii) migration and invasion. Our results showed that HYP/P123 micelles had effective and selective time- and dose-dependent phototoxic effects on cervical cancer cells but not in HaCaT. Moreover, HYP/P123 micelles accumulated in endoplasmic reticulum, mitochondria and lysosomes, resulting in photodynamic cell death mainly by necrosis. HYP/P123 induced cellular oxidative stress mainly via type II mechanism of PDT and inhibited cancer cell migration and invasion mainly via MMP-2 inhibition. Taken together, our results indicate a potentially useful role of HYP/P123 micelles as a platform for HYP delivery to more specifically and effectively treat cervical cancers through PDT, suggesting they are worthy for in vivo preclinical evaluations.

In vitro study of disodium cromoglicate as a novel effective hydrotrope solvent for hypericin utilisation in photodynamic therapy

Hypericin (HY) is a naphthodianthrone that naturally occurs in Hypericum perforatum L. It is a promising photosensitiser used in photodynamic therapy for and diagnosis of oncological diseases. However, its hydrophobic character is an obstacle that has prevented its efficient use. The commonly used solvent, dimethyl sulfoxide (DMSO), is a controversial constituent of HY formulations and its use has been rejected by many researchers studying HY both in vitro and in vivo. In this study, we propose the utilisation of hydrotropy to solubilise HY in an aqueous environment. Cromolyn (DSCG) is a non-toxic, well-tolerated, antiallergic drug that has been employed in clinical practice since 1970, and in aqueous solution it acts as a hydrotrope. At a molecular ratio of 1:12,000 HY to DSCG, the compound is able to solubilise HY in aqueous environment. In an HT-29 cell suspension, DSCG (1.8 mmol L-1) considerably enhances the interaction between HY (150 nmol L-1) and HT-29 cells, which leads to an HY fluorescence emission increase with a half-time approximately 2 min compared to 29 min for samples that lack DSCG. Studies using HT-29 adenocarcinoma cells showed that DSCG at a given concentration significantly improved accumulation of HY within cells compared to DMSO (p < 0.05) despite the relative resistance of the HT-29 cell line to HY-PDT. Though no significant difference between total reactive oxygen species production was observed for photoactivated HY dissolved in DMSO and DSCG, significant singlet oxygen generation by photoactivated HY dissolved in a DSCG-containing water solution at the studied molecular ratio was confirmed. We also clarified that DSCG does not act as a scavenger of ABTS and galvinoxyl free radicals. The results from an MTT assay showed that DSCG also significantly enhanced the cytotoxicity of photoactivated HY compared to DMSO (p < 0.05). This study has demonstrated the ability of DSCG to act as a solvent of HY and enhance the effectiveness of HY-PDT compared to the commonly used organic solvent, DMSO.

Optical Imaging Approaches to Monitor Static and Dynamic Cell-on-Chip Platforms: A Tutorial Review

Miniaturized laboratories on chip platforms play an important role in handling life sciences studies. The platforms may contain static or dynamic biological cells. Examples are a fixed medium of an organ-on-a-chip and individual cells moving in a microfluidic channel, respectively. Due to feasibility of control or investigation and ethical implications of live targets, both static and dynamic cell-on-chip platforms promise various applications in biology. To extract necessary information from the experiments, the demand for direct monitoring is rapidly increasing. Among different microscopy methods, optical imaging is a straightforward choice. Considering light interaction with biological agents, imaging signals may be generated as a result of scattering or emission effects from a sample. Thus, optical imaging techniques could be categorized into scattering-based and emission-based techniques. In this review, various optical imaging approaches used in monitoring static and dynamic platforms are introduced along with their optical systems, advantages, challenges, and applications. This review may help biologists to find a suitable imaging technique for different cell-on-chip studies and might also be useful for the people who are going to develop optical imaging systems in life sciences studies.

Impact of ConcanavalinA affinity in the intracellular fate of Protein Corona on Glucosamine Au nanoparticles

Biological fate and toxicity of nanoparticles (NPs) are connected to the interaction between NPs and the protein corona (PC) spontaneously forming around NPs in biological matrixes. PC is a dynamic entity that confers biological identity to NPs. In this work, fluorescence cross-correlation spectroscopy (FCCS) is used to study the impact of specific interactions between the NP surface and proteins on the intracellular fate of PC. The stability of the PC formed around glucosamide-functionalized Au-NPs from ConcanavalinA (ConA) or Bovine Serum Albumin (BSA) is characterized by FCCS. The NPs show higher affinity for ConA and competitive assays show that ConA easily exchanges BSA. A549 cells are exposed to glucosamide-functionalized Au-NPs with preformed ConA and BSA PCs. Intracellularly the frequency of cross-correlation for Au NPs with ConA PC remains constant to a 70% value until 24 h while for BSA it decreases to a 15% during the same period. FCCS measurements in several locations in the cell point out a different level of aggregation for the NPs with either ConA or BSA PCs. Our results show that the affinity of NPs functionalized with a ligand with affinity for a specific protein in bulk is retained intracellularly influencing NP fate and translocation.