Nieves Márquez

An acetone extract of Helichrysum italicum ssp. microphyllum afforded the phloroglucinol alpha-pyrone arzanol (1a) as a potent NF-kappaB inhibitor. Arzanol is identical with homoarenol (2a), whose structure should be revised. The phloroglucinol-type structure of arzanol and the 1,2,4-trihydroxyphenyl-type structure of the base-induced fragmentation product of homoarenol could be reconciled in light of a retro-Fries-type fragmentation that triggers a change of the hydroxylation pattern of the aromatic moiety. On the basis of these findings, the structure of arenol, the major constituent of the clinically useful antibiotic arenarin, should be revised from 2b to 1b, solving a long-standing puzzle over its biogenetic derivation. An alpha-pyrone (micropyrone, 7), the monoterpene rac-E-omega-oleoyloxylinalol (10), four known tremetones (9a-d), and the dimeric pyrone helipyrone (8) were also obtained. Arzanol inhibited HIV-1 replication in T cells and the release of pro-inflammatory cytokines in LPS-stimulated primary monocytes, qualifying as a novel plant-derived anti-inflammatory and antiviral chemotype worth further investigation.

Coumarins and structurally related compounds have been recently shown to present anti-human immunodeficiency virus, type 1 (HIV-1) activity. Among them, the dietary furanocoumarin imperatorin is present in citrus fruits, in culinary herbs, and in some medicinal plants. In this study we report that imperatorin inhibits either vesicular stomatitis virus-pseudotyped or gp160-enveloped recombinant HIV-1 infection in several T cell lines and in HeLa cells. These recombinant viruses express luciferase as a marker of viral replication. Imperatorin did not inhibit the reverse transcription nor the integration steps in the viral cell cycle. Using several 5' long terminal repeat-HIV-1 constructs where critical response elements were either deleted or mutated, we found that the transcription factor Sp1 is critical for the inhibitory activity of imperatorin induced by both phorbol 12-myristate 13-acetate and HIV-1 Tat. Moreover in transient transfections imperatorin specifically inhibited phorbol 12-myristate 13-acetate-induced transcriptional activity of the Gal4-Sp1 fusion protein. Since Sp1 is also implicated in cell cycle progression we further studied the effect of imperatorin on cyclin D1 gene transcription and protein expression and in HeLa cell cycle progression. We found that imperatorin strongly inhibited cyclin D1 expression and arrested the cells at the G(1) phase of the cell cycle. These results highlight the potential of Sp1 transcription factor as a target for natural anti-HIV-1 compounds such as furanocoumarins that might have a potential therapeutic role in the management of AIDS.

The persistence of latent HIV-infected cellular reservoirs represents the major hurdle to virus eradication on patients treated with HAART. It has been suggested that successful depletion of such latent reservoirs will require a combination of therapeutic agents that can specifically and efficiently act on cells harboring latent HIV-1 provirus. Using Jurkat-LAT-GFP cells, a tractable model of HIV-1 latency, we have found that bryostatin -1 reactivates HIV-1 through a classical PKC-dependent pathway. Bryostatin-1 also activates MAPKs and NF-κB pathways and synergizes with HDAC inhibitors to reactivate HIV-1 from latency. Bryostatin-1 downregulates the expression of the HIV-1 co-receptors CD4 and CXCR4 and prevented de novo HIV-1 infection in susceptible cells. We applied proteomic methods to investigate major changes in protein expression in Jurkat-LAT-GFP under latency and reactivation conditions. We identified up-regulation of proteins that may be involved in the innate anti-HIV-1 response (NKEF-A and MHD2) and in different cell functions (i.e. cofilin-1 and transgelin-2) of the host cells. PKC agonists may represent a valuable pharmacological approach to purge latent HIV from cellular reservoirs and at the moment, the only clinically available PKC agonist is bryostatin-1. This drug has been tested in numerous clinical trials and its pharmacokinetics and toxicity in humans is well known. Moreover, bryostatin-1 potently synergizes with other HDAC inhibitors commonly used in the medical practice such as valproic acid. Therefore, bryostatin-1, alone or in combination with HDAC inhibitors, could be used in HAART treated patients to validate the hypothesis that reactivating HIV-1 from latency could purge HIV-1 reservoirs.