Tatsuya Sugawara

Glycolipids from edible plant sources were accurately quantified by silica-based, normal-phase high-performance liquid chromatography using an evaporative light-scattering detector. Five major glycolipid classes (acylated steryl glucoside, steryl glucoside, ceramide monohexoside, monogalactosyldiacylglycerol, and digalactosyldiacylglycerol) were separated and determined with a binary gradient system consisting of chloroform and methanol/water (95:5, vol/vol) without any interference from other l

The antiangiogenic effects of fucoxanthin and a deacetylated product, fucoxanthinol, were examined. Fucoxanthin significantly suppressed HUVEC proliferation and tube formation at more than 10 microM, but it had no significant effect on HUVEC chemotaxis. The formation of blood vessel-like structures from CD31-positive cells was evaluated using embryonic stem cell-derived embryoid bodies. Fucoxanthin effectively suppressed the development of these structures at 10-20 microM, suggesting that it cou

Sea cucumber is a health-beneficial food, and contains a variety of physiologically active substances including glycosphingolipids. We show here the sphingoid base composition of cerebrosides prepared from sea cucumber and the cytotoxicity against human colon cancer cell lines. The composition of sphingoid bases prepared from sea cucumber was different from that of mammals, and the major constituents estimated from mass spectra had a branched C17–19 alkyl chain with 1–3 double bonds. The viabili

Astaxanthin, a carotenoid found mainly in seafood, has potential clinical applications due to its antioxidant activity. In this study, we evaluated the effect of dietary astaxanthin derived from Haematococcus pluvialis on skin photoaging in UVA-irradiated hairless mice by assessing various parameters of photoaging. After chronic ultraviolet A (UVA) exposure, a significant increase in transepidermal water loss (TEWL) and wrinkle formation in the dorsal skin caused by UVA was observed, and dietary

Siphonaxanthin is a specific keto-carotenoid in green algae whose bio-functional properties are yet to be identified. This review focuses on siphonaxanthin as a bioactive compound and outlines the evidence associated with functionality. Siphonaxanthin has been reported to potently inhibit the viability of human leukemia HL-60 cells via induction of apoptosis. In comparison with fucoxanthin, siphonaxanthin markedly reduced cell viability as early as 6 h after treatment. The cellular uptake of sip

Sphingolipids are ubiquitous in eukaryotic organisms and are significant components in foods. It has been reported that treatment with sphingolipids prevents colon cancer, improves skin barrier function and suppresses inflammatory responses. However, the mechanisms for those effects of dietary sphingolipids are not well understood. In this study, to investigate the effects of dietary glucosylceramide (GluCer) and sphingomyelin (SM) on skin function, we characterized the recovery of skin barrier

mammalian sphingolipids is sphingosine ( trans -4-sphingenine, d18:1 4t ). Smaller amounts of other sphingoid bases, such as sphinganine (dihydrosphingosine, d18:0) and phytosphingosine (4-hydroxysphinganine, t18:0), are encountered frequently. In higher plants, the structures of sphingoid bases are more complicated than in mammals, because they can be desaturated at the C8-position by a 8-sphingolipid desaturase, yielding cis -and trans -isomers of 8-unsaturated sphingoid bases (d18:2 4t,8c(t)

Liquid chromatography-mass spectrometry is one of the most powerful methods for the identification and detection of chemical structures of lipids. In this study, we attempted to identify the chemical structures of glucosylceramides from maize, rice, mushroom (maitake) and sea cucumber by liquid chromatography-ion trap mass spectrometry. For structural analysis of glucosylceramides, [M+H]+, [M+H-18]+ or [M+H-162]+ in the positive scan mode was used for MS/MS analysis to obtain product ion spectra

The aim of this study was to determine whether sphingoid bases that originated from various dietary sources, such as mammals, plants, and fungi, are substrates for P-glycoprotein in differentiated Caco-2 cells, which are used as a model of intestinal epithelial cells. In Caco-2 cells, the uptake of sphingosine, the most common sphingoid base found in mammals, was significantly higher at physiological temperatures than those of cis/trans-8-sphingenine, trans-4, cis/trans-8-sphingadienine, 9-methy