在病理及生理過程中低氧誘導細胞壓力變化使內皮細胞產生活性氧自由基(ROS),人類與低氧相關而產生的疾病已有許多文獻證實,例如糖尿病、貧血、組織細胞受損、呼吸系統改變、中風、血管栓塞、腫瘤、甚至死亡。關於黃芩抗發炎及抗癌機制探討之文獻甚多,黃芩具有保肝、降血壓及防止粥狀動脈硬化等多種功效。 本實驗利用黃芩代謝物取代中草藥原形物可更接近體內試驗(in vivo),所使用濃度為5 μl/mL和10 μl/mL,將細胞置於低氧狀態不同時間以模擬血管栓塞發病後不同時間的狀況,分別是低氧時間二小時、低氧時間四小時、低氧時間四小時並再回氧四小時、低氧時間八小時、低氧時間四小時並再回氧二十小時,並探討在低氧誘導內皮細胞損傷時黃芩所產生的保護作用。本實驗進行人類臍帶靜脈內皮細胞(HUVECs)與人類單核球細胞株(THP-1)之細胞培養、THP-1細胞貼附試驗之發炎分析、酵素連結免疫分析法(ELISA)測細胞凋亡率、西方墨點法(Western blot) 分析蛋白質表現量。 由實驗結果得知,黃芩代謝物10μl/mL功效良好,能藉由抑制細胞間黏附分子-1 (ICAM-1)而抑制THP-1細胞的貼附作用,並抑制發炎因子環氧化酵素-2(COX-2)產生抗發炎功效,且能調節低氧血管內皮細胞損傷時產生的低氧誘導因子-1 (HIF-1)。因此,黃芩對於低氧血管內皮細胞具有保護作用,可望成為預防心血管疾病的保健中草藥。
Hypoxia can induce the reactive oxygen species (ROS) production from endothelial cells in pathological and physiological response. In many clinical environment or diseases such as DM, anemia, tumor, atherosclerosis, hypoxia state was found in tissue. From many studies, it was found that Scutellariae Radix, one kind of herbs drugs, has many benefit effects. Scutellariae Radix is an good anti-inflammatory and antioxidant. In this study, we used the metabolite of Scutellariae Radix (5 μl/mL, 10 μl/mL) to study the protective effects on hypoxia-induced endothelial cells injury. We used different hypoxia time periods such as 2 hours, 4 hours, 8 hours to simulate illness. We used the following methods: Human Umbilical Vein Endothelial Cells (HUVECs) culture and the human acute monocytic leukemia cell line (THP-1 cells) culture, THP-1 cell adhesion assay for inflammation, ELISA for cell apoptosis, Western Blot assay for protein expression. In the results, we found the metabolite of Scutellariae Radix (10 μl/mL) has benefits on prevention cell adhesion via inhibits intercellar adhesion molecule-1 (ICAM-1) and its molecular products on hypoxia, such as cyclooxygenase-2 (COX-2) and hypoxia induciable factor-1(HIF-1). Therefore, Scutellariae Radix may be used to prevent the cardiovascular diseases.