Optometry Research Today is a free monthly online journal that collates and summarizes the latest research about Optometry, including details on myopia, optometric practice, therapy.

Dietary antioxidants provide differential subcellular protection in epithelial cells.

Jarrett SG, Cuenco J, Boulton M

Cell and Molecular Biology Unit, School of Optometry and Vision Sciences, Cardiff University, Cardiff, UK.

This study aimed to evaluate the organelle-specific antioxidant/pro-oxidant actions of clinically important dietary antioxidants against oxidative stress. An in vitro cellular model was employed to investigate the antioxidant/pro-oxidant effects of various concentrations (1, 10 and 100 microM) of ascorbic acid, alpha-tocopherol and beta-carotene during H2O2-induced oxidative stress. Damage to nuclear and mitochondrial genomes was analyzed by quantitative polymerase chain reaction and oxidation of membrane lipids was measured via colorimetric assays. The key findings were: (i) dietary antioxidants conferred a dose-dependent protective effect (with a pro-oxidant shift at higher concentrations); (ii) the protection conferred to different sub-cellular organelles is highly specific to the dietary antioxidant; (iii) the mtDNA is highly sensitive to oxidative attack compared to nDNA (P < 0.05); and (iv) mtDNA protection conferred by dietary antioxidants was required to improve protection against oxidative-induced cell death. This study shows that antioxidant-induced protection of mtDNA is an important target for future oxidative stress therapies.

Published 20 September 2006 in Redox Rep, 11(4): 144-52.
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