Curcumin Reduces Amyloid Fibrillation of Prion Protein and Decreases Reactive Oxidative Stress

Abstract

Misfolding and aggregation into amyloids of the prion protein (PrP) is responsible for the development of fatal transmissible neurodegenerative diseases. Various studies on curcumin demonstrate promise for the prevention of Alzheimer’s disease and inhibition of PrPres accumulation. To evaluate the effect of curcumin on amyloid fibrillation of prion protein, we first investigated the effect of curcumin on mouse prion protein (mPrP) in a cell-free system. Curcumin reduced the prion fibril formation significantly. Furthermore, we monitored the change in apoptosis and reactive oxygen species (ROS) level upon curcumin treatment in mouse neuroblastoma cells (N2a). Curcumin effectively rescues the cells from apoptosis and decreases the ROS level caused by subsequent co-incubation with prion amyloid fibrils. The assays in cell-free mPrP and in N2a cells of this work verified the promising effect of curcumin on the prevention of transmissible neurodegenerative diseases.

Protective Effects of Indian Spice Curcumin Against Amyloid-β in Alzheimer’s Disease

“…Curcumin effectively rescues the cells from apoptosis and decreases the ROS level caused by subsequent co-incubation with prion amyloid fibrils. The assays in cell-free mPrP and in N2a cells of this work verified the promising effect of curcumin on the prevention of transmissible neurodegenerative diseases [107]. …”

“…Lin and colleagues (2013) [107] evaluated the effect of curcumin on amyloid fibrillation of prion protein on mouse prion protein (mPrP) in a cell-free system. Curcumin reduced the prion fibril formation significantly.…”

Curcumin promotes fibril formation in F isomer of human serum albumin via amorphous aggregation

“…Earlier we have also shown that the curcumin rescues the protein from aggregation by increasing the reconfiguration rate [15]. Moreover, many researchers using a diverse group of peptides and proteins have demonstrated that curcumin inhibits fibril formation through one or other mechanisms [11,[14][15][16][17][18][19][20]. These studies form a very strong basis for the inhibitor hypothesis of curcumin.…”

“…These results indicated that F isomers preincubated with curcumin acquired a state which is more susceptible to aggregation than the N isomer. Curcumin, the main polyphenolic compound found in the spice turmeric, has been shown to inhibit fibrillar aggregation of different types of protein and peptides [14][15][16][17][18][19][20]. Recently, two independent works on the effect of curcumin on the amyloid fibril formation showed that curcumin promoted amyloid fibril formation by binding to oligomeric species of intrinsically disordered proteins (IDPs) [21,22].…”

Targeting Assembly and Disassembly of Protein Aggregates

“…Curcumin selectively binds to, inhibits the aggregation of, and disassembles non-native, disease-related PrP isoforms [179]. It protects scrapie-infected neuroblastoma (scNB) [180] and murine neuroblastoma (N2a) cells [181] from the accumulation of neurotoxic PrP aggregates.…”