The marine environment has proven to be a very rich source of extremely potent compounds that have demonstrated significant activities in antitumor, anti-parasitic, anti-microbial, anti-coagulants’, antiviral, cytotoxic compounds, anti-inflammatory, proteins. Aplidine is a promosing anti-tumor agent that is derived from the Mediterranean tunicate Aplidum albicans. We have found that aplidine at...

BACKGROUND Attachment of leukemic cells to vascular endothelial cells induces the vascular endothelial cells to release endothelial cell-derived interleukin 8 (endothelial IL-8), which then induces leukemic cells to undergo apoptosis. NB4, a human promyelocytic leukemic cell line that expresses high levels of cell-surface CD13/aminopeptidase N, does not undergo endothelial IL-8-induced apoptosi...

The eukaryotic translation initiation factor 4E (eIF4E), which is the main composition factor of eIF4F translation initiation complex, influences the growth of tumor through modulating cap-dependent protein translation. Previous studies reported that ribavirin could suppress eIF4E-controlled translation and reduce the synthesis of onco-proteins. Here, we investigated the anti-leukemic effects o...

Inhibitory natural killer cell receptor (NKR)-expressing cells may induce a graft-versus-leukemia/tumor (GVL/T) effect against leukemic cells and tumor cells that have mismatched or decreased expression of HLA class I molecules and may not cause graft-versus-host disease (GVHD) against host cells that have normal expression of HLA class I molecules. In our study, we were able to expand inhibito...

Inorganic arsenic trioxide (As2O3) was recently shown to induce apoptosis in NB4 promyelocytic leukemic cells. We have investigated the effects of the organic arsenical, melarsoprol (a drug used for treatment of trypanosomiasis), upon induction of apoptosis in cell lines representative of chronic B-cell lymphoproliferative disorders. An Epstein-Barr virus (EBV)-transformed B-prolymphocytic cell...

CD38 is expressed during early stages of differentiation in normal and leukemic myeloid cells. Recently, CD38 has been shown to participate in intracellular signal transduction pathways following its ligation with CD38-specific mAbs. In this study we report that ligation of CD38 by one such agonistic mAb (IB4) induced proliferation of cultured leukemic cells in vitro. In HL-60, KG-1A, NB4, and ...

The Na(+)/H(+) exchanger isoform 1 (NHE1) is primarily responsible for the regulation of intracellular pH (pH(i)). It is a ubiquitous, amiloride-sensitive, growth factor-activatable exchanger whose role has been implicated in cell-cycle regulation, apoptosis, and neoplasia. Here we demonstrate that leukemic cell lines and peripheral blood from primary patient leukemic samples exhibit a constitu...

Histone deacetylase (HDAC) inhibitors are a class of drugs used in the cancer treatment. Here, we developed library 19 analogues Vorinostat, an HDAC inhibitor lymphomas In replaced hydrophobic phenyl group with various tricyclic ‘caps’ possessing central, eight-membered, heterocyclic ring, and investigated activity cytotoxic effect on normal cell lines. We found that 3 out compounds, based dibe...

Cyclic AMP (cAMP)-dependent protein kinase may play a role in the functional and morphological differentiation of leukemic cells. In this study, we showed that the cAMP analogs. potent activators of protein kinase recently shown to be selective for either site 1 or site 2 cAMP binding sites of protein kinase, demonstrate potent growth inhibition of acute promyelocytic, chronic myelocytic, and a...

C HRONIC LYMPHOCYTIC LEUKEMIA (CLL) B cells are, in general, highly refractory to transformation by Epstein-Barr virus (EBV),’ and therefore, relatively few EBV-immortalized cell lines originating from CLL cells have been described.’4 In this paper we report the establishment of a novel EBV-transformed B cell line from the leukemic cells of a CLL patient that expressed surface u immunoglobulin....