Biomedical subjects

Seung Chun Park

Publications and source records attributed to Seung Chun Park.

4 recordsLinked to original sources

PubMed2006

Mechanism of isoproterenol-induced RGS2 up-regulation in astrocytes.

Regulators of G protein signaling (RGSs) are inducibly expressed in response to various stimuli and the up-regulation of RGSs leads to significant decreases in GPCR responsiveness. Isoproterenol, an adrenergic receptor agonist, stimulated RGS2 mRNA in C6 rat astrocytoma cells. The up-regulation of RGS2 mRNA was abrogated by genistein, a protein tyrosine kinase inhibitor (PTK), and by broad-spectrum protein kinase C (PKC) inhibitors (staurosporine and GF109203X). alpha-Adrenergic antagonist (prazocin), beta-adrenergic antagonist (prazocin), and pertussis toxin only partially blocked the RGS2 up-regulation, suggesting that the RGS2 up-regulation is concomitantly mediated by Galphai, Galphas, and Galphaq. It is interesting to note that SB203580, a potent p38 mitogen-activated protein kinase (MAPK) inhibitor, completely inhibited the isoproterenol-mediated RGS2 expression. In addition, isoproterenol also markedly stimulated RGS2 mRNA in rat primary astrocytes, which were sensitive to SB203580 and staurosporine. Therefore, our data suggest that adrenergic receptor-mediated signaling (induced by isoproterenol) may be involved in the regulation of RGS2 expression in astrocytes via activating PTK, PKC, and p38 MAPK.

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PubMed2006

The expression patterns of RGS transcripts in platelets.

Regulators of G protein signalling (RGS) are involved in the negative regulation of cell activation processes and are involved in the pathophysiology of cardiovascular diseases. To get some further evidence for a role of RGS proteins in platelets, we determined the expression profile of RGS-specific mRNA in rat platelets using reverse transcription-polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) with a poly dT18 primer and transcript-specific primers. We found that RGS2, RGS3, RGS5, RGS6, RGS10, RGS14, RGS16 and RGS18, Leukemia-associated Rho-GEF factor (LARG), and Galpha interacting protein (GAIP) were differentially expressed in platelets. The highest expression rate was found for RGS18 (about 1.3 fold when compared to GAPDH), followed by LARG, RGS6, RGS10 and RGS16 (0.7 to 0.95), whereas expression rates for RGS2, RGS3, RGS5, RGS14, and GAIP were in a range of 0.1 to 0.3. Our results suggest that G-protein-coupled receptor-mediated signalling in platelet may be regulated mainly by RGS 18, 16, 10, 6, and LARG.

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PubMed2006

Surfactin C inhibits platelet aggregation.

This study was designed to investigate the effect of surfactin C, which is derived from Bacillus subtilis, on platelet aggregation and homotypic leucocyte aggregation. Surfactin C strongly and dose-dependently inhibited platelet aggregation, which was stimulated both by thrombin (0.1 U mL(-1)), a potent agonist that activates the G protein-coupled protease receptor, and by collagen (5 microg mL(-1)), a potent ligand that activates alpha(IIb)beta(3) with IC50 values (concentration inhibiting platelet aggregation by 50%) of 10.9 and 17.0 microM, respectively. Moreover, surfactin C significantly suppressed the intracellular Ca(2+) mobilization in thrombin-activated platelets. Surfactin C, however, did not affect various integrin-mediated U937 cell aggregation, implying that the anti-platelet activity of surfactin C was not due to its detergent effect but by its action on the downstream signalling pathway. Therefore, the results suggest that surfactin C may have a beneficial therapeutic effect on aberrant platelet aggregation-mediated cardiovascular diseases.

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PubMed2005

Synergistic antiinflammatory effects of pinitol and glucosamine in rats.

This study evaluated the antiinflammatory activities of pinitol and glucosamine either alone or in combination against carrageenan- and cotton pellet-induced acute and subacute inflammation in rats. Five groups were included in each of the acute and subacute inflammation studies: the vehicle control group, positive control group (aminopyrine 100 mg/kg), pinitol group (20 mg/kg), glucosamine group (25 mg/kg) and a pinitol (20 mg/kg) and glucosamine (25 mg/kg) combination group. When 20 mg/kg of pinitol was administered to the rats, paw edema induced by the carrageenan injection was significantly suppressed and the level of granuloma formation induced by the cotton pellet implantation was slightly reduced. When 25 mg/kg of glucosamine was administered, paw edema caused by the acute inflammation was slightly reduced and the level of granuloma formation caused by the subacute inflammation was strongly suppressed. Although the combined application of pinitol and glucosamine did not have an additional antiinflammatory effect on the paw edema caused by acute inflammation, it did have an increased antiinflammatory effect on the formation of granuloma induced by subacute inflammation. Therefore, pinitol and glucosamine have an antiinflammatory effect on acute and subacute conditions. Moreover, a synergistic antiinflammatory effect against subacute inflammation was observed when the two chemicals were administered in combination.

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