Arbutin increases Caenorhabditis elegans longevity and stress resistance
- Published
- Accepted
- Subject Areas
- Animal Behavior, Biochemistry, Molecular Biology
- Keywords
- arbutin, C. elegans, daf-16, stress, longevity
- Copyright
- © 2017 Zhou et al.
- Licence
- This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, reproduction and adaptation in any medium and for any purpose provided that it is properly attributed. For attribution, the original author(s), title, publication source (PeerJ Preprints) and either DOI or URL of the article must be cited.
- Cite this article
- 2017. Arbutin increases Caenorhabditis elegans longevity and stress resistance. PeerJ Preprints 5:e3405v1 https://doi.org/10.7287/peerj.preprints.3405v1
Abstract
Arbutin (p-hydroxyphenyl-β-D-glucopyranoside), a well-known tyrosinase inhibitor, has been widely used as a cosmetic whitening agent. Although its natural role is to scavenge free radicals within cells, it has also exhibited useful activities for the treatment of diuresis, bacterial infections and cancer, as well as anti-inflammatory and anti-tussive activities. Because function of free radical scavenge is also related to antioxidant and the effects of arbutin on longevity and stress resistance in animals have not yet been confirmed, here the effects of arbutin on Caenorhabditis elegans were investigated. The results demonstrated that optimal doses of arbutin can extend lifespan and enhance resistance to oxidative stress. The underlying molecular mechanism for these effects involves decreased level of reactive oxygen species (ROS), improvement of daf-16 nuclear localization, and upregulation of expression of daf-16 and its downstream targets, including sod-3 and hsp16.2. In this work the roles of arbutin in lifespan and health are studied and the results support the use of arbutin as an antioxidant for maintaining overall health.
Author Comment
This is a submission to PeerJ for review.
Supplemental Information
Effect of arbutin on the lifespan of C. elegans
Wild type animals (N = 120-182 in each group) were treated without (0 mM) or with low (0.5, 2.5 mM), moderate (5 mM, p < 0.001) and high (10, 20 mM) doses of arbutin at 20 ℃ from birth, when survival was monitored. The experiment was repeated multiple times and a representative trial is shown.
Effect of pretreatment with arbutin on resistance to stress in C. elegans
Animals were treated with 5 mM arbutin from birth to 120 hours at 20 ℃ and exposed to a variety of stressors. Worms pretreated with arbutin survived significantly longer after (A-B) 35 ℃ heat shock (N = 66-84 animals, p < 0.05), (C-D) exposure to 200 μM juglone (N = 90 animals, p < 0.001) or (E-F) UV irradiation at 1000 J/m2 (N = 68-96 animals, p < 0.001). Each experiment is representative of three independent trials.
Effect of arbutin on ROS accumulation on C. elegans
Wild type N2 animals treated with 5 mM arbutin accumulated less ROS than wild type N2 control animals. (N = 24-25 times and 20 animals per group . p < 0.001).
Effect of arbutin on resistance to stress in transgenic strain CF1038 C. elegans
Animals were treated with 5 mM arbutin from birth to 120 hours at 20 ℃ and exposed to a variety of stressors. There was no survival significance with worms pretreated with or without arbutin after (A-B) 35 ℃ heat shock (N = 74 animals, p > 0.05), (C-D) exposure to 200 μM juglone (N = 96 animals, p > 0.05) or (E-F) UV irradiation at 1000 J/m2 (N = 85-88 animals, p > 0.05). Each experiment is representative of three independent trials.
Effect of arbutin on DAF-16::GFP nuclear localization on transgenic strain TJ356
Worms treated with 5 mM arbutin (A-B) displayed a fluorescence intensity that was significantly upregulated (E) relative to the control group (C-D). (N = 10 animals per group, p < 0.001).
Effect of arbutin on relative mRNA levels of daf-16, sod-3 and hsp-16.2 of C. elegans. )
daf-16 (P < 0.001) and its downstream targets sod-3 (P < 0.05) and hsp-16.2 (P < 0.001) were all upregulated with arbutin treatment relative to the control. (N = 3 and 200 animals per group, p < 0.05).
Effect of arbutin on brood size of C. elegans
There was no significant difference in the number of total progeny between arbutin-treated and untreated animals (N = 10 animals per group, p > 0.05).