To develop effective and safe acne vulgaris therapies with a continuing demand for new solutions, we investigated unique efficacy of an antibacterial agent from marine brown alga Eisenia bicyclis in treating acne vulgaris. The methanolic extract of E. bicyclis exhibited potential antibacterial activity against acne-related bacteria. The ethyl acetate fraction showed the strongest antibacterial activity against the bacteria among solvent fractions. Six compounds (1-6), previously isolated from the ethyl acetate fraction of E. bicyclis, were evaluated for antibacterial activity against acne-related bacteria. Among them, compound 2 (fucofuroeckol-A [FF]) exhibited the highest antibacterial activity against acne-related bacteria with a minimum inhibitory concentration (MIC) ranging from 32 to 128 μg mL -1 . Furthermore, FF clearly reversed the high-level erythromycin and lincomycin resistance of Propionibacterium acnes. The MIC values of erythromycin against P. acnes were dramatically reduced from 2,048 to 1.0 μg mL -1 in combination with MIC of FF (64 μg mL -1). The fractional inhibitory concentration indices of erythromycin and lincomycin were measured from 0.500 to 0.751 in combination with 32 or 64 μg mL -1 of FF against all tested P. acnes strains, suggesting that FF-erythromycin and FF-lincomycin combinations exert a weak synergistic effect against P. acnes. The results of this study suggest that the compounds derived from E. bicyclis can be a potential source of natural antibacterial agents and a pharmaceutical component against acnerelated bacteria.Key Words: acne-related bacteria; antimicrobial activity; Eisenia bicyclis; phlorotannins; synergistic effect INTRODUCTIONAcne vulgaris is a common skin disease affecting children and adolescents. The pathogenesis of acne is multifactorial and complex. There are four important factors that cause acne in humans, such as an increase in sebum secretion, keratinization of the follicle, bacteria, and inflammation (Farrar and Ingham 2004). Pro pionibacterium acnes, Staphylococcus epidermidis, S. aureus, and Pseudomonas aeruginosa are often involved in the development of abnormal follicular keratinization and inflammation (Yamaguchi et al. 2009 This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/3.0/) which permits unrestricted non-commercial use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. 48 MATERIALS AND METHODS Raw materials and extractionIn late September 2010, E. bicyclis was purchased from Ulleung Trading Co. (Ulleung-gun, Korea). A voucher specimen has been deposited in the author's laboratory. Dried E. bicyclis was finely ground and powdered with a food mixer (HMF-1000A; Hanil Electronics, Seoul, Korea). The dried powder was vacuum-packed and kept at -20°C until use. The dried E. bicyclis powder (1.0 kg) was extracted with methanol (MeOH; 10 L × 3) at 70°C for 3 h (3 times) and the solvent was evaporated ...

This study identified components of attentional bias (e.g. attentional vigilance, attentional avoidance and difficulty with disengagement) that are critical characteristics of survivors of dating violence (DV). Eye movements were recorded to obtain accurate and continuous information regarding attention. DV survivors with high post-traumatic stress symptoms (DV-High PTSS group; n = 20) and low post-traumatic stress symptoms (DV-Low PTSS group; n = 22) and participants who had never experienced DV (NDV group; n = 21) were shown screens displaying emotional (angry, fearful and happy) faces paired with neutral faces and negative (angry and fearful) faces paired with happy faces for 10 s. The results indicate that the DV-High PTSS group spent longer dwelling on angry faces over time compared with the DV-Low PTSS and NDV groups. This result implies that the DV-High PTSS group focused on specific trauma-related stimuli but does not provide evidence of an attentional bias towards threatening stimuli in general.

This study investigated the time-course characteristics of attentional bias, such as vigilance and maintenance, towards violent stimuli in dating violence (DV) survivors. DV survivors with PTSD symptoms (DV-PTSD group; n=14), DV survivors without PTSD symptoms (Trauma Control group; n=14), and individuals who were never exposed to dating violence (NDV group; n=15) viewed slides that presented four categories of images (violent, dysphoric, positive, and neutral) per slide, for ten seconds. Our results revealed that the DV-PTSD group spent more time on violent stimuli than did the Trauma Control or NDV groups. The DV survivors, both with and without PTSD symptoms, spent more time on dysphoric stimuli and less time on happy stimuli than did the NDV group. In addition to the effects of PTSD, researchers should also be considering the effects of simple traumatic exposure.

Voltage-gated potassium (Kv) channels are known to be involved in cancer development and cancer cell proliferation. KV9.3, an electronically silent subunit, forms heterotetramers with KV2.1 in excitable cells and modulates its electrophysiological properties. However, the role of KV9.3 alone in non-excitable cancer cells has not been studied. Here, we evaluated the effect of silencing KV9.3 on cancer cell proliferation in HCT15 colon carcinoma cells and A549 lung adenocarcinoma cells. We confirmed the expression of KV9.3 mRNA in HCT15 and A549 cells and showed that silencing KV9.3 using small interfering RNA caused G0/G1 cell cycle arrest and alterations in cell cycle regulatory proteins in both HCT15 and A549 cells without affecting apoptosis. Also, stable knockdown of KV9.3 expression using short-hairpin RNA inhibited tumor growth in SCID mouse xenograft model. Using a bioinformatics approach, we identified Sp1 binding sites in the promoter region of the gene encoding KV9.3. We further found that Sp1 bound to this region and showed that the Sp1 inhibitor, mithramycin A, induced a concentration-dependent decrease in KV9.3 expression. Taken together, these data suggest that knockdown of KV9.3 inhibits proliferation in colon carcinoma and lung adenocarcinoma cell lines and may be regulated by Sp1.

No abstract