Cell Lines

Example 49

The functional activity of compounds was determined in a cell line where p70S6K is constitutively activated. Test article was dissolved in DMSO to make a 10 μM stock. PathScan® Phospho-S6 Ribosomal Protein (Ser235/236) Sandwich ELISA Kit was purchased from Cell Signaling Technology. A549 lung cancer cell line, was purchased from American Type Culture Collection. A549 cells were grown in F-12K Medium supplemented with 10% FBS. 100 μg/mL penicillin and 100 μg/mL streptomycin were added to the culture media. Cultures were maintained at 37° C. in a humidified atmosphere of 5% CO₂ and 95% air. 2.0×10⁵ cells were seeded in each well of 12-well tissue culture plates for overnight. Cells were treated with DMSO or test article (starting at 100 μM, 10-dose with 3 fold dilution) for 3 hours. The cells were washed once with ice cold PBS and lysed with 1× cell lysis buffer. Cell lysates were collected and samples were added to the appropriate wells of the ELISA plate. Plate was incubated for overnight at 4° C. 100 μL of reconstituted Phospho-S6 Ribosomal Protein (Ser235/236) Detection Antibody was added to each well and the plate was incubated at 37° C. for 1 hour. Wells were washed and 100 μl of reconstituted HRP-Linked secondary antibody was added to each well. The plate was incubated for 30 minutes at 37° C. Wash procedure was repeated and 100 μL of TMB Substrate was added to each well. The plate was incubated for 10 minutes at 37° C. 100 μL of STOP Solution was added to each well and the absorbance was read at 460 nm using Envision 2104 Multilabel Reader (PerkinElmer, Santa Clara, CA). IC₅₀ curves were plotted and IC₅₀ values were calculated using the GraphPad Prism 4 program based on a sigmoidal dose-response equation.

Unless otherwise noted, compounds that were tested had an IC₅₀ of less than 50 μM in the S6K Binding assay. A=less than 0.05 μM; B=greater than 0.05 μM and less than 0.5 μM; C=greater than 0.5 μM and less than 10 μM;

Example 17

To further validate the activity of the DMPK siRNAs, many of the sequences that showed the best activity in the initial screen were selected for a follow-up evaluation in dose response format. Once again, two human cell lines were used to assess the in vitro activity of the DMPK siRNAs: first, SJCRH30 human rhabdomyosarcoma cell line; and second, Myotonic Dystrophy Type 1 (DM1) patient-derived immortalized human skeletal myoblasts. The selected siRNAs were transfected in a 10-fold dose response at 100, 10, 1, 0.1, 0.01, 0,001, and 0.0001 nM final concentrations or in a 9-fold dose response at 50, 5.55556, 0.617284, 0.068587, 0.007621, 0.000847, and 0.000094 nM final concentrations. The siRNAs were formulated with transfection reagent Lipofectamine RNAiMAX (Life Technologies) according to the manufacturer's “forward transfection” instructions. Cells were plated 24 h prior to transfection in triplicate on 96-well tissue culture plates, with 8500 cells per well for SJCRH30 and 4000 cells per well for DM1 myoblasts. At 48 h (SJCRH30) or 72 h (DM1 myoblasts) post-transfection cells were washed with PBS and harvested with TRIzol® reagent (Life Technologies). RNA was isolated using the Direct-zol-96 RNA Kit (Zymo Research) according to the manufacturer's instructions. 10 μl of RNA was reverse transcribed to cDNA using the High Capacity cDNA Reverse Transcription Kit (Applied Biosystems) according to the manufacturer's instructions. cDNA samples were evaluated by qPCR with DMPK-specific and PPIB-specific TaqMan human gene expression probes (Thermo Fisher) using TaqMan® Fast Advanced Master Mix (Applied Biosystems). DMPK values were normalized within each sample to PPIB gene expression. The quantification of DMPK downregulation was performed using the standard 2^−ΔΔCt a method. All experiments were performed in triplicate, with Tables 16A-B, 17A-B, and 18A-B presenting the mean values of the triplicates as well as the calculated IC₅₀ values determined from fitting curves to the dose-response data by non-linear regression.

Example 7

The MTT Cell Proliferation assay determines cell survival following apple stem cell extract treatment. The purpose was to evaluate the potential anti-tumor activity of apple stem cell extracts as well as to evaluate the dose-dependent cell cytotoxicity.

Principle: Treated cells are exposed to 3-(4,5-dimethythiazol-2-yl)-2,5-diphenyl tetrazolium bromide (MTT). MTT enters living cells and passes into the mitochondria where it is reduced by mitochondrial succinate dehydrogenase to an insoluble, colored (dark purple) formazan product. The cells are then solubilized with DMSO and the released, solubilized formazan is measured spectrophotometrically. The MTT assay measures cell viability based on the generation of reducing equivalents. Reduction of MTT only occurs in metabolically active cells, so the level of activity is a measure of the viability of the cells. The percentage cell viability is calculated against untreated cells.

Method: A549 and NCI-H520 lung cancer cell lines and L132 lung epithelial cell line were used to determine the plant stem cell treatment tumor-specific cytotoxicity. The cell lines were maintained in Minimal Essential Media supplemented with 10% FBS, penicillin (100 U/ml) and streptomycin (100 μg/ml) in a 5% CO₂ at 37 Celsius. Cells were seeded at 5×10³ cells/well in 96-well plates and incubated for 48 hours. Triplicates of eight concentrations of the apple stem cell extract were added to the media and cells were incubated for 24 hours. This was followed by removal of media and subsequent washing with the phosphate saline solution. Cell proliferation was measured using the MTT Cell Proliferation Kit I (Boehringer Mannheim, Indianapolis, IN) New medium containing 50 μl of MTT solution (5 mg/ml) was added to each well and cultures were incubated a further 4 hours. Following this incubation, DMSO was added and the cell viability was determined by the absorbance at 570 nm by a microplate reader.

In order to determine the effectiveness of apple stem cell extracts as an anti-tumor biological agent, an MTT assay was carried out and IC50 values were calculated. IC50 is the half maximal inhibitory function concentration of a drug or compound required to inhibit a biological process. The measured process is cell death.

Results: ASC-Treated Human Lung Adenocarcinoma Cell Line A549.

Results: ASC-Treated Human Squamous Carcinoma Cell Line NCI-H520.

Results: ASC-treated Lung Epithelial Cell Line L132.

Summary Results: Cytotoxicity of Apple Stem Cell Extracts.

Apple stem cell extracts killed lung cancer cells lines A549 and NCI-H520 at relatively low doses: IC50s were 12.58 and 10.21 μg/ml respectively as compared to 127.46 μg/ml for the lung epithelial cell line L132. Near complete anti-tumor activity was seen at a dose of 250 μg/ml in both the lung cancer cell lines. This same dose spared more than one half of the L132 cells. See Tables 7-10. The data revealed that apple stem cell extract is cytotoxic to lung cancer cells while sparing lung epithelial cells. FIG. 6 shows a graphical representation of cytotoxicity activity of apple stem cell extracts on lung tumor cell lines A549, NCIH520 and on L132 lung epithelial cell line (marked “Normal”). The γ-axis is the mean % of cells killed by the indicated treatment compared to unexposed cells. The difference in cytotoxicity levels was statistically significant at p≤05.

Example 9

The experiment of Example 7 was repeated substituting other plant materials for ASC. Plant stem cell materials included Dandelion Root Extract (DRE), Aloe Vera Juice (AVJ), Apple Fiber Powder (AFP), Ginkgo Leaf Extract (GLE), Lingonberry Stem Cells (LSC), Orchid Stem Cells (OSC) as described in Examples 1 and 2. The concentrations of plant materials used were nominally 250, 100, 50, 25, 6.25, 3.125, 1.562, and 0.781 μg/mL. These materials were tested only for cells the human lung epithelial cell line L132 (as a proxy for normal epithelial cells) and for cells of the human lung adenocarcinoma cell line A549 (as a proxy for lung cancer cells).

A549 cells lung cancer cell line cytotoxicity results for each of the treatment materials.

DRE-Treated Lung Cancer Cell Line A549 Cells.

AVJ-Treated Lung Cancer Cell line A549 Cells.

AFP-Treated Lung Cancer Cell line A549 Cells.

GLE-treated Lung Cancer Cell line A549 Cells.

LSC-treated lung cancer cell lines A549 cells.

OSC-treated Lung Cancer Cell line A549 Cells.

L132 cells (“normal” lung epithelial cell line) cytotoxicity results for each of the treatment materials.

DRE-Treated Lung Epithelial Cell Line L132 cells.

AVJ-Treated Lung Epithelial Cell Line L132 cells.

AFP-Treated Lung Epithelial Cell Line L132 cells.

GLE-Treated Lung Epithelial Cell Line L132 cells.

LSC-Treated Lung Epithelial Cell Line L132 cells.

OSC-Treated Lung Epithelial Cell Line L132 cells.

Calculated values.