Lipophilic bile acids are suggested to be involved in the endogenous expression of CYP3A4 in human and experimental animals as ligands of nuclear receptors. To verify the nuclear receptor specificity, the bile acid-mediated induction of CYP3A4 has been studied in vitro and in vivo in the present study. Lithocholic acid (LCA) strongly enhanced the activities of the CYP3A4 reporter gene, which co...

DPC 681 (N-[(3-fluorophenyl)methyl]glycyl-N-[3-[((3-aminophenyl) sulfonyl)-2-(aminophenyl)amino]-(1S,2S)-2-hydroxy-1-(phenyl-methyl)propyl]-3-methyl-l-valinamide) is a potent peptide-like human immunodeficiency virus protease inhibitor that was evaluated in phase I clinical trials. In primary cultures of hepatocytes, DPC 681 significantly induced the testosterone 6beta-hydroxylase activity of r...

Assessing the inducibility of CYP3A4 by various xenobiotics can predict potential drug interactions. In the present investigation, human hepatoma cells were stably integrated with either the CYP3A4 enhancer region and a luciferase reporter gene or the CYP3A4-luciferase construct and the human pregnane X receptor (PXR). Several colonies containing one to three copies of luciferase per cell were ...

P-glycoprotein (P-gp) and cytochrome P450 3A4 (CYP3A4) are expressed in the intestine and are associated with drug absorption and metabolism. Pregnane X receptor (PXR) is the key molecule that regulates the expression of P-gp and CYP3A4. Given that PXR activity is regulated by a variety of compounds, it is possible that unknown PXR activators exist among known medicines. Kampo is a Japanese tra...

Idiosyncratic hepatotoxicity has been associated with the oral tyrosine kinase inhibitor lapatinib, which is used in metastatic breast cancer therapy. Lapatinib is extensively metabolized by cytochrome P450 3A4/5 to yield an O-debenzylated metabolite, which can undergo further oxidation to a reactive quinone imine. A recent clinical study reported that concomitant use of lapatinib with dexameth...

We have established a stable human cell line, termed HPL-A3, by co-transfection of a human pregnane X receptor (hPXR) expression vector and a reporter plasmid (p3A4-hPXRE-Luc) containing a luciferase gene and a promoter/enhancer region of the human cytochrome P450 3A4 (CYP3A4) gene into a human hepatoma-derived cell line, HepG2. We then examined the usefulness of HPL-A3 for a chemically activat...

CYP3A4, the predominant cytochrome P450 (P450) expressed in human liver and intestine, contributes to the metabolism of approximately half the drugs in clinical use today. CYP3A4 catalyzes the 6beta-hydroxylation of a number of steroid hormones and is involved in the bioactivation of environmental procarcinogens. The expression of CYP3A4 is affected by several stimuli, including environmental f...

The molecular mechanisms of regulation of the CYP3A4 gene have been examined in an in vitro reporter gene system, containing -1 kb of the CYP3A4 promoter, in a HepG2 cell line. This system allows for the separate and combined transfection of expression plasmids encoding the human glucocorticoid receptor (hGR) and the human pregnane X receptor (hPXR), and, therefore, the opportunity to assess th...

CYP3A4, the predominant but variably expressed cytochrome P450 of adult human liver, is subject to multifaceted constitutive regulation as well as transcriptional induction by a variety of structurally unrelated xenobiotics. Using transient transfections in HepG2 cells, we previously demonstrated the existence of a potent xenobiotic-responsive enhancer module located between - 7.2 and - 7.8 kil...