Synergism of phospholipids in extracts of marine invertebrates

The qualitative and quantitative compositions of the phospholipids of prostaglandin extracts of 18 species of marine invertebrates have been determined. A correlation has been shown between the set of phospholipids in the extract and prostaglandin-like activity. For samples with a high prostaglandin-like activity in the set of phospholipids the presence of either diphosphatidylglycerol, phosphatidyl glycerol, phosphatidylethanolamine or a combination of these lipids is necessary.Pacific Ocean Institute of Bioorganic Chemistry. Far Eastern Branch, Russian Academy of Sciences, Vladivostok. Translated from Khimiya Prirodnykh Soedinenii, No. 2, pp. 205–208, March–April, 1993.     

Gas chromatography of some prostaglandins

Summary The synthetic prostaglandin F_2α (PG_2α), used as an ovulation regulator, and abortion inducer, is contaminated with its Δ5-trans isomer. The ratio of the isomers was measured by capillary GC. The prostaglandin I₂ (PGI₂), a blood platelet aggregation inhibitor, easily decomposes to 6-ketoprostaglandin F_1α (6-keto PG_1α). Their ratio was measured by packed column GC. An unexpected, instantaneous methanol cleavage was observed during the GC analysis of the methyl ketal derivative of 6-keto PG_1α, forming a mixture of PGI₂ and Δ6-prostaglandin I₁ (Δ6-PGI₁). Presented at the 15th International Symposium on Chromatography, Nürnberg, October 1984     

Spatiotemporal alteration of phospholipids and prostaglandins in a rat model of spinal cord injury

We determined quantitative and qualitative alterations in lipids during the occurrence and progression of spinal cord injury (SCI) in rats to identify potential clinical indicators of SCI pathology. Imaging mass spectrometry (IMS) was used to visualize twelve molecular species of phosphatidylcholine (PC) on thin slices of spinal cord with SCI. In addition, twelve species of phospholipids and five species of prostaglandins (PGs) were quantified by liquid chromatography-electrospray ionization-tandem mass spectrometry (LC-ESI-MS/MS) of lipid extracts from control/injured spinal cords. Unique distribution patterns were observed for phospholipids with different fatty acid compositions, and distinct dynamic changes were seen in both their amounts and their distributions in tissue as tissue damage resulting from SCI progressed. In particular, PCs containing docosahexaenoic acid localized to the large nucleus in the anterior horn region at one day post-SCI and rapidly decreased thereafter. In contrast, PCs containing arachidonic acid (AA-PCs) were normally found in the posterior horn region and were intensely and temporarily elevated one week after SCI. Lysophosphatidylcholines (LPCs) also increased at the same SCI stage and in regions with elevated AA-PCs, indicating the release of AA and the production of PGs. Moreover, LC-ESI-MS/MS analysis of lipid extracts from the spinal cord tissue at the impact site demonstrated a peak in PGE2 that reflected the elevation/reduction pattern of AA-PCs and LPC. Although further investigation is required, we suggest that invasive immune cells that penetrated from the impaired blood-brain barrier at 1-2 weeks post-SCI may have produced LPCs, released AA from AA-PCs, and produced PGs in SCI tissue at sites enriched in AA-PCs/LPC.     

High-performance thin-layer chromatographic determination of trigonelline content in various extracts and different varieties of some commercial coffees available in the Saudi Arabian market

JPC – Journal of Planar Chromatography – Modern TLC - The proposed research study was undertaken to establish a simple, rapid and sensitive high-performance thin-layer chromatography...     

Enantiospecific interactions between cholesterol and phospholipids

The effects of cholesterol on various membrane proteins have received considerable attention. An important question regarding each of these effects is whether the cholesterol exerts its influence by binding directly to membrane proteins or by changing the properties of lipid bilayers. Recently it was suggested that a difference in the effects of natural cholesterol and its enantiomer, ent-cholesterol, would originate from direct binding of cholesterol to a target protein. This strategy rests on the fact that ent-cholesterol has appeared to have effects on lipid films similar to those of cholesterol, yet fluorescence microscopy studies of phospholipid monolayers have provided striking demonstrations of the enantiomer effects, showing opposite chirality of domain shapes for phospholipid enantiomer pairs. We observed the shapes of ordered domains in phospholipid monolayers containing either cholesterol or ent-cholesterol and found that the phospholipid chirality had a great effect on the domain chirality, whereas a minor (quantitative) effect of cholesterol chirality could be observed only in monolayers with racemic dipalmitoylphosphatidylcholine. The latter is likely to derive from cholesterol-cholesterol interactions. Accordingly, cholesterol chirality has only a modest effect that is highly likely to require the presence of solidlike domains and, accordingly, is unlikely to play a role in biological membranes.     

Interrelation between hydration and interheadgroup interaction in phospholipids

The stability and the ionic conductivity of biological membranes and of lipid bilayers depend on their hydration. A small number of water molecules adhere strongly to the different residues of the lipid headgroups and are oriented by them. An additional number of water molecules adhere more weakly, preserving their freedom of rotation, but are essential for bestowing the thermodynamic properties of hydrated bilayers and of biological membranes. Around six water molecules are attached so strongly to the headgroups of different phospholipids (PL) that they are rendered unfreezable, or their freezing is extended over such a wide range of temperatures that it cannot be detected by differential scanning calorimetry (DSC). If cholesterol is added to the PL above the concentration at which phase separation of the cholesterol phase occurs, the number of unfreezable water molecules per PL increases, indicating that the PL molecules on the border line between the two phases attach nearly twice as many water molecules as those in the middle of the phase. The orientation of about seven or eight water molecules attached to PL headgroups (seven to phosphatidyl serine (PS)) can be detected by polarized FTIR. The dichroic ratio of the successively adhering water molecules to the headgroup of PS fluctuates between 2.6 and 2.9, with the cumulative value of about 2.8 for the seven water molecules adhering to the headgroup of PS. In addition, in this case, the number of water molecules oriented by PL molecule residues on the border line of the two phases is much larger ( approximately 13 for PS). Interaction between two opposite negatively charged layers containing PS approaching each other may lead, after correlated electrostatic attraction, to change in the conformation of the headgroups with concomitant dehydration. This process is enhanced by Ca(+) and by Li(+), but it may also occur with Na(+) and K(+) as counter-ions if the layers are mutually aligned. This process may be important in the fusion mechanism of biological membranes, and its molecular modeling has been carried out.     

The exchange of erythrocyte membrane phospholipids with rat liver extracts in vitro.

Intact rat or human erythrocytes and their isolated (ghost) membranes were incubated with the high speed supernatant fraction of homogenates derived from 32P-labeled rat livers. Phospholipid molecules were transferred between the red cell membranes and the liver extracts, as reflected by the convergence of their specific radioactivities with time. Whereas ghosts usually approached isotopic equilibrium with the liver supernatant fraction during a few hours of incubation at 37 degrees C, the exchange of phospholipids by intact cells was no more than one-half, even after 18 hr. Phosphatidylcholine, phosphatidylethanolamine, phosphatidylserine and sphingomyelin were all exchanged in both intact cells and ghosts, albeit to different extents. (A control experiment, incubating 32P-labeled rat erythrocytes or ghosts with unlabeled rat liver extracts, also demonstrated the exchange of all four major phospholipids.) These data may signify that the phospholipids on the cytoplasmic side of the membrane of intact erythrocytes do not exchange with the phospholipids in exogenous liver extracts. If so, all four major phospholipid classes would appear to be present to some extent at both membrane surfaces. The first inference is in agreement with several other studies on this membrane, while the second inference is not.     

One-dimensional thin-layer chromatographic separation of phospholipids and lysophospholipids from tissue lipid extracts.

A modified one-dimensional thin-layer chromatographic procedure is presented for the separation from tissues of five phospholipids (phosphatidylserine, phosphatidylethanolamine, phosphatidylinositol, phosphatidylcholine and sphingomyelin) and three lysophospholipids (lysophosphatidylserine, lysophosphatidylethanolamine and lysophosphatidylcholine). This is achieved by simple involvement of 0.4% ammonium sulphate in silica gel H and of acetone in a developing solvent as chloroform-methanol-acetic acid-acetone-water (40:25:7:4:2, v/v). The procedure is simple and the separation is reproducible. The weakness of this method is the partial degradation of phosphatidylethanolamine to lysophosphatidylethanolamine, but a method to prevent this degradation is also presented.     

FT-Raman spectroscopic studies of guarana and some extracts

The Raman spectrum of guarana, an important product of the Amazonian rain forest, has been investigated; the therapeutic properties of guarana and it's extracts have been realised for some time and have been attributed to guaranine, which could be a complex of caffeine and tannins or to a new xanthine natural product. The purpose of this study is two-fold: firstly, to provide molecular structural information about guarana seeds and their extracts and, secondly, to test the viability of using the technique as a method of verification of genuine guarana extracts from synthetic composites. Raman spectroscopy shows that the composition of the guarana is very similar for the whole seed and for the outer and inner portions of the dissected seed, which are closely similar also to the ground commercial powders produced in the Amazon for the distributors. The results indicate that Fourier-transform Raman spectroscopy could be used for the monitoring of quality control of guarana products in the phytopharmaceutical industry.     

Neutral lipids, phospholipids, and biological activity of extracts from Zygophyllum oxianum

The chemical composition of lipid extracts from aerial parts of Zygophyllum oxianum was determined by GC and TLC. The yield of total lipids was 0.75% in leaves, 0.33% in stems, and 0.49% in fruit calculated for fresh plant mass. Phospholipids were represented by nine classes, of which phosphatidylcholine dominated (55.8% in leaves, 56.4% in stems, 63.7% in fruit of total PL). The n-BuOH extract from the plant aerial part exhibited noticeable antifungal activity. The CHCl₃:MeOH (2:1) extract from leaves and stems exhibited pronounced in vitro cytotoxicity against human bladder carcinoma cell line 5637 with IC₅₀ 6.2 μg/mL.     

Comparison between thin-layer chromatography and overpressured layer chromatography fingerprints of commercial essential oils and accelerated solvent extraction plant extracts

Developing fit-to-purpose analytical screening methods for plant marker constituents by simple and affordable techniques represents a constant and important request from the current transformation chain of plant products. In this work, methods developed on classical thin-layer chromatography (TLC) and overpressured layer chromatography (OPLC) have been applied on some of the most valuable commercial plant products, such as star anise (Illicium verum Hook. f.) essential oil and extracts, common thyme (Thymus vulgaris L.) and sweet fennel (Foeniculum vulgare Mill.) essential oils and acerola fruit (Malpighia punicifolia L.) hydroalcoholic extracts, to evaluate OPLC potentiality in comparison with TLC performances in the detection of some characteristic constituents. OPLC provided higher performance with respect to TLC in all experiments performed due to higher selectivity demonstrated on all the tested marker compounds except for flavonoids in acerola extracts. Considering the usage of planar chromatography in the quality control of plant derivatives, the present paper shows how the OPLC protocols were both highly time- and solvent-saving in comparison with classical TLC.

     

Molecular characteristics of some commercial high-molecular-weight hyaluronans

Commercially available hyaluronan (HA) samples were investigated by the method of size exclusion chromatography (SEC). The fractions eluted from the SEC column were on-line molecularly characterized by using a multi-angle laser light scattering (MALLS) photometer. Along with the SEC-MALLS technique, the high-molecular-weight HA biopolymers were (off-line) analyzed by capillary viscometry.     

Interaction between glycophorin and phospholipids in recombined systems.

Both the MN-glycoprotein from human erythrocytes and the hydrophobic fragment from the protein isolated with trypsin treatment, T(is), have been recombined with egg phosphatidylcholine in bilayers at various phospholipid/protein ratios. In order to investigate the effect of the protein on the phospholipid headgroups, 31P nuclear magnetic resonance spectra were obtained with the MN-glycoprotein recombined with egg phosphatidylcholine, which revealed two classes of phospholipid environments, one immobilized and one not immobilized. Electron spin resonance (ESR) of fatty acid methyl ester spin labels provided supporting evidence. Computer analysis of the ESR spectra indicate that 4-5 moles of phospholipid are immobilized per mole of protein over a wide range of lipid-to-protein ratios. The immobilization of the phospholipids appears mediated by both the polar headgroups and the hydrocarbon tails of the phospholipid.     

TLC fingerprint of phenolics and saponins in commercial extracts of Yucca schidigera Roezl.

Yucca schidigera Roezl. (yucca) is one of the major industrial sources of steroid saponins approved by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) as generally recognized as safe. Due to the increasing applications of yucca extracts, there is a need for a simple, low-cost method for the authentication of samples. This paper presents a method to obtain unique fingerprints of commercial products of yucca using a single-thin layer chromatography (TLC) system and two visualization reagents for the detection of phenolics and saponins, as a tool for the preliminary quality assessment of the products.     

Molecular interactions between phospholipids and mangostin in a lipid bilayer

Molecular interactions between phospholipids and mangostin in a lipid bilayer have been investigated in terms of the maximum additive concentration (MAC) of mangostin in liposomes, the surface potential, particle size, microscopic-viscosity and microscopic-polarity of liposomes, and the permeability of glucose. The mangostin used is a natural product extract: 1,3,6-trihydroxy-7-methoxy-2,8-bis(3-methyl-2-butenyl)-9-xanthenenone.

The MAC of mangostin was fairly dependent upon the nature of the liposomes (uncharged, negatively charged or positively charged). Solubilization of mangostin in the liposomal bilayer resulted in both an increase in the negative charge on the liposomal surface, strenghthening the state of the bilayer membrane, and a depression in the release of the glucose involved. Mangostin was found to temporarily stabilize the liposomal bilayer, although the bilayer membrane is still unstable in the long run.