The flavonoid Salvigenin is active against Trypanosoma cruzi Epimastigotes

SPINA RM; SOSA MA; CANO R; BARRERA P; CIFUENTE DA; LOZANO E

Merlo-San Luis

Congreso; XXXV Reunión Científica Anual de la Sociedad de Biología de Cuyo; 2017

Sociedad de Biología de Cuyo

Trypanosoma cruzi is the etiological agent of Chagas disease. In cultures, these parasites cycle between the flagellate epimastigote form, and scarcely they differentiate into the infective trypomastigote. Natural compounds extracted from plants have shown to be effective against the parasite. Among them, flavonoids are an important family of natural compounds largerly studied. In this study, a novel flavone, Salvigenin (SVG), purified from aerial parts of Baccharis scandens, has been evaluated on T. cruzi growth. We used epimastigotes of T cruzi (Dm28c strain) in axenic cultured conditions and treated with different concentrations of the SVG dissolved in DMSO. SVG exhibited an antiproliferative effect on epimastigotes, even at very low concentrations. This effect was irreversible even at short time (1 h) of exposure to the drug. Also, the drug affects the mitochondrial activity of the parasites, as evaluated with MTT. Based on this results and the SVG structure, a possible mechanism of action of the compound would be throughout of reactive oxygen species (ROS). By using the probe 2´,7´-Diclocrofluorescein diacetate (H2DCFDA) we measured ROS in parasites and observed that SVG induces increase of ROS production, which was proportional to the drug concentration. We concluded that SVG affects T. cruzi proliferation by multiple mechanisms during the cell cycle and through mitochondrial dysfunction. Further studies should be done to identify the molecular targets of the parasites