Project description:We showed a kind of rectangular shaped gold-based nanoparticles (gold nanocages, GNC) could enhance the survival of cells from hydroxyurea induced cell apoptosis and significantly reduced the reactive oxygen species (ROS) levels.The nanoparticles could initiate single layer isolation membrane elongation after been phagocytosed, followed by autophagosome and autolysosome formation, then specifically integrated into the autophagosome inner membrane and bind to p62. Through recycling ribosome proteins and activate Nrf2 mediated activation of GATA3 signaling, rescue the cell death and enhanced cell and life survival.
Project description:Serine protease inhibitor Kazal type 3 (Spink3) is a trypsin inhibitor in the pancreas. Spink3-/- pancreatic acinar cells are dead with excessive autophagy at birth (p0.5). To prove the role of nonapoptotic cell death with autophagy, we generated by transgenic technology the pancreas of Spink3-/-;XKI/+ mice contained both normal and dying acinar cells with autophagy. In this new mouse model, chronic inflammation occurred in the pancreas, indicating that some signals from nonapoptotic dead cell induce chronic inflammation in the pancreas. All samples were the pancreas at p0.5. Sample 1 and 2 are the pancreas from wild type (Spink3+/+, control) mice. Sample 3 and 4 are the pancreas from Spink3-/-, which all pancreatic acinar cells show induced nonapoptotic cell death with autophagy. Sample 5 and 6 are the pancreas from Spink3-/-XKI/+, about half acinar cells are normal, but other acinar cells show induced nonapoptotic cell death with autophagy.
Project description:For oncological purposes, hyperthermia has increasingly emerged as a good therapeutic option for patients without fitness to undergo surgery, or for those with surgically inaccessible tumors. However, tumor recurrence after photothermal therapy constitutes a significant barrier to achieving good survival outcome. In this study, we used a gold nanocluster (GNC) micelle system capable of multiple NIR laser exposure; RNA-seq analysis revealed that repeated NIR exposure upregulates heat-shock protein and cell-cycle process-related genes that could be associated with tumor recurrence. To prevent recurrence, we presented an RNA-seq-guided drug combination strategy of GNC, docetaxel, and quercetin via a nano-system. Quercetin treatment downregulated heat-shock protein expression and inhibited function of P-gp with mild antitumor activity. Furthermore, docetaxel treatment demonstrated antitumor activity with significant G2-M cell-cycle arrest. When two of GNC, docetaxel, and quercetin were administered together, they showed a synergistic antitumor effect, whereas when the drugs were administered simultaneously in a triple combination, a very strong synergistic effect was achieved, as indicated through increased apoptosis induction and cell-cycle arrest in vitro and in vivo. The data from this study emphasize the benefit of triple combination and outlines potential translational directions for photothermal-chemotherapy.
Project description:A safer design and higher eficacy of nano-gold therapeutic formulations requires examination of cellular responses to gold nanoparticles (AuNPs). In this work we compared cellular uptake, cytotoxicity and RNA expression patterns induced in Caco-2 cells of citrate-stabilized Au NP of two different sizes (5 and 30 nm). The toxicity was measured with Colony Forming Efficiency (CFE) and Trypan Blue assays at 24 and 72 h after exposure to AuNPs in the 10 - 300 mM range. Toxicity was observed only in the CFE assay, at 200 and 300 mM exposure levels, and exclusively for smaller AuNPs size. Cellular internalization was dose and time-dependent for both AuNPs. The most pronounced changes in gene expression, evaluated with Agilent microarrays, were detected at 72 h (300 mM) for 5 nm AuNPs, with 103 up and 708 down regulated transcripts. For 30 nm AuNPs, only 4 gene transcripts were repressed under these conditions. The biological processes affected by 5 nm AuNPs were: RNA/zinc ion/transition metal ion binding (decreased), cadmium/copper ion binding and glutathione metabolism (increased). Some Nrf2 responsive genes (several metallothioneins, HMOX, G6PD, OSGIN1 and GPX2) were highly up regulated. Members of the selenoproteins (SELT, SELK, 15 kDa selenoprotein, SEPP1 and GPX2) were also differentially expressed. Our findings indicate that at high concentrations, smaller AuNPs can induce metal exposure and oxidative stress signaling pathways, and might influence selenium homeostasis. Therefore, some observed effects associated with nano-gold cytotoxicity can be further explored as potential enhancers of anti-cancer properties of already existing AuNPs based nanomedicin. Caco-2 cells were expoxed to spherical gold nanoparticles of two different sizes and concentrations (5 and 30 nm AuNPs, 100 and 300 microM). Cells were collected after 24 or 72 hours
Project description:A safer design and higher eficacy of nano-gold therapeutic formulations requires examination of cellular responses to gold nanoparticles (AuNPs). In this work we compared cellular uptake, cytotoxicity and RNA expression patterns induced in Caco-2 cells of citrate-stabilized Au NP of two different sizes (5 and 30 nm). The toxicity was measured with Colony Forming Efficiency (CFE) and Trypan Blue assays at 24 and 72 h after exposure to AuNPs in the 10 - 300 mM range. Toxicity was observed only in the CFE assay, at 200 and 300 mM exposure levels, and exclusively for smaller AuNPs size. Cellular internalization was dose and time-dependent for both AuNPs. The most pronounced changes in gene expression, evaluated with Agilent microarrays, were detected at 72 h (300 mM) for 5 nm AuNPs, with 103 up and 708 down regulated transcripts. For 30 nm AuNPs, only 4 gene transcripts were repressed under these conditions. The biological processes affected by 5 nm AuNPs were: RNA/zinc ion/transition metal ion binding (decreased), cadmium/copper ion binding and glutathione metabolism (increased). Some Nrf2 responsive genes (several metallothioneins, HMOX, G6PD, OSGIN1 and GPX2) were highly up regulated. Members of the selenoproteins (SELT, SELK, 15 kDa selenoprotein, SEPP1 and GPX2) were also differentially expressed. Our findings indicate that at high concentrations, smaller AuNPs can induce metal exposure and oxidative stress signaling pathways, and might influence selenium homeostasis. Therefore, some observed effects associated with nano-gold cytotoxicity can be further explored as potential enhancers of anti-cancer properties of already existing AuNPs based nanomedicin.
Project description:Gastric Cancer (GC) is one of the most serious cancers with high incidence and mortality all over the world. Chemotherapy hadn’t led to desirable effect and targeted therapy brings about a new stage to cancer treatment. Ramucirumab is the first FDA-approved monotherapy for advanced gastric cancer. It is well known that gold nanorod, a nontoxic biocompatible nanomaterial, is an especially promising candidate for cancer theranostic. In this study, Ramucirumab (Ab) were first modified by gold nanoparticles to enhance uptake efficiency. The simple Nano-delivery system had taken perfect aggregation effect in vivo even better than 5-fold Ab treatment. Gold nanomaterials, especially gold nanorod (AuNR), could induce direct cytotoxic effect to cancer cell in the presence of Ab, while Ab or gold nanoparticle themselves couldn’t lead to such direct killing effect even at an extremely high concentration. Transcriptomic and proteomic analyses revealed the mechanism of this direct cytotoxicity.
Project description:Targeting protein degradation is recognized as a valid approach to cancer therapy. The ubiquitin-proteasome system (UPS) and the autophagy-lysosome pathway are two major pathways for intracellular protein degradation. Proteasome inhibitors such as bortezomib are clinically approved for treating malignancies, but to date, they are still unsatisfactory for cancer therapy. This study identifies titania-coated gold nano-bipyramid (NBP/TiO2) nanostructures as an autophagic flux inhibitor, as the smallest NBP/TiO2 nanostructures induce significant autophagosome accumulation in human glioblastoma U-87 MG cells via blocking the autophagosome-lysosome fusion process and inhibiting lysosomal degradation. Further study indicates that NBP/TiO2 nanostructures reduce the intracellular level of mature cathepsin B and directly inhibit the proteolytic activity of cathepsin B, thereby further inhibiting trypsin-like proteolytic activity, which is a potential cotarget for UPS inhibition. NBP/TiO2 nanostructures interact synergistically with bortezomib to suppress the viability of U-87 MG cells, as the combined treatment synergistically induces the intracellular accumulation of ubiquitinated protein and endoplasmic reticulum stress. In addition, photothermal therapy further synergistically reduces the cell viability. In summary, this study suggests that NBP/TiO2 nanostructures function as a promising anticancer agent in combination with proteasome inhibitors.
Project description:To deeply investigate the details of the nano-SiO2 effects, we examined the gene expression profile alterations after nano-SiO2 treatment in BMMCs. The difference analysis between the groups showed that 285 genes were significantly expressed after treatment with nano-SiO2. Compared with the blank group, both nano-SiO2 exposure and DNP-HSA stimulation increased the expression of genes related to the MAPK signaling pathway in mast cells to varying degrees.
Project description:Serine protease inhibitor Kazal type 3 (Spink3) is a trypsin inhibitor in the pancreas. Spink3-/- pancreatic acinar cells are dead with excessive autophagy at birth (p0.5). To prove the role of nonapoptotic cell death with autophagy, we generated by transgenic technology the pancreas of Spink3-/-;XKI/+ mice contained both normal and dying acinar cells with autophagy. In this new mouse model, chronic inflammation occurred in the pancreas, indicating that some signals from nonapoptotic dead cell induce chronic inflammation in the pancreas.