PMID- 11943071
OWN - NLM
STAT- MEDLINE
DCOM- 20031124
LR  - 20191105
IS  - 1472-6882 (Electronic)
IS  - 1472-6882 (Linking)
VI  - 2
DP  - 2002 Feb 19
TI  - Potential antimutagenic activity of berberine, a constituent of Mahonia 
      aquifolium.
PG  - 2
AB  - BACKGROUND: As part of a study aimed at developing new pharmaceutical products 
      from natural resources, the purpose of this research was twofold: (1) to 
      fractionate crude extracts from the bark of Mahonia aquifolium and (2) to 
      evaluate the strength of the antimutagenic activity of the separate components 
      against one of the common direct-acting chemical mutagens. METHODS: The 
      antimutagenic potency was evaluated against acridine orange (AO) by using Euglena 
      gracilis as an eukaryotic test model, based on the ability of the test 
      compound/fraction to prevent the mutagen-induced damage of chloroplast DNA. 
      RESULTS: It was found that the antimutagenicity of the crude Mahonia extract 
      resides in both bis-benzylisoquinoline (BBI) and protoberberine alkaloid 
      fractions but only the protoberberine derivatives, jatrorrhizine and berberine, 
      showed significant concentration-dependent inhibitory effect against the 
      AO-induced chloroplast mutagenesis of E. gracilis. Especially berberine elicited, 
      at a very low dose, remarkable suppression of the AO-induced mutagenicity, its 
      antimutagenic potency being almost three orders of magnitude higher when compared 
      to its close analogue, jatrorrhizine. Possible mechanisms of the antimutagenic 
      action are discussed in terms of recent literature data. While the potent 
      antimutagenic activity of the protoberberines most likely results from the 
      inhibition of DNA topoisomerase I, the actual mechanism(s) for the BBI alkaloids 
      is hard to be identified. CONCLUSIONS: Taken together, the results indicate that 
      berberine possesses promising antimutagenic/anticarcinogenic potential that is 
      worth to be investigated further.
FAU - Cernakova, Marta
AU  - Cernakova M
AD  - Department of Environmental Sciences, Faculty of Chemical Technology, Slovak 
      Technical University, SK-81237 Bratislava, Slovak Republic. cernakm@chtf.stuba.sk
FAU - Kost'alova, Daniela
AU  - Kost'alova D
FAU - Kettmann, Viktor
AU  - Kettmann V
FAU - Plodova, Miriam
AU  - Plodova M
FAU - Toth, Jaroslav
AU  - Toth J
FAU - Drimal, Jan
AU  - Drimal J
LA  - eng
PT  - Journal Article
PT  - Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't
DEP - 20020219
PL  - England
TA  - BMC Complement Altern Med
JT  - BMC complementary and alternative medicine
JID - 101088661
RN  - 0 (Antimutagenic Agents)
RN  - 0 (Plant Extracts)
RN  - 091S1F8V5Q (jatrorrhizine)
RN  - 0I8Y3P32UF (Berberine)
SB  - IM
MH  - Animals
MH  - Antimutagenic Agents/*pharmacology
MH  - Berberine/*analogs & derivatives/*pharmacology
MH  - Dose-Response Relationship, Drug
MH  - Euglena gracilis/drug effects
MH  - *Mahonia/chemistry
MH  - *Phytotherapy
MH  - Plant Bark
MH  - Plant Extracts/*pharmacology
PMC - PMC101396
EDAT- 2002/04/12 10:00
MHDA- 2003/12/03 05:00
PMCR- 2002/02/19
CRDT- 2002/04/12 10:00
PHST- 2001/12/17 00:00 [received]
PHST- 2002/02/19 00:00 [accepted]
PHST- 2002/04/12 10:00 [pubmed]
PHST- 2003/12/03 05:00 [medline]
PHST- 2002/04/12 10:00 [entrez]
PHST- 2002/02/19 00:00 [pmc-release]
AID - 1472-6882-2-2 [pii]
AID - 10.1186/1472-6882-2-2 [doi]
PST - epublish
SO  - BMC Complement Altern Med. 2002 Feb 19;2:2. doi: 10.1186/1472-6882-2-2.