Carminomycin is a new antitumor antibiotic [1].
Antibiotics are a type of antimicrobial used in the treatment of bacterial infection. They can inhibit the growth of bacteria. Antitumor antibiotics are effective agents widely used in cancer chemotherapy [2].
Carminomycin is a new antitumor antibiotic isolated from the mycelium of Actinomadura carminata containing seven components, five of which are biologically active. The more interesting components are components 1, 2 and 3 [1]. In human MCF-7 breast carcinoma and human K562 leukemia cell lines, carminomycin inhibited cell growth with IC50 values of 90 and 60 nM, respectively. In Pgp-expressing MCF-7Dox and K562i/S9 cell lines, carminomycin inhibited cell growth with a similar activity compared with wild type cells, which suggested that carminomycin could circumvent Pgp-mediated multidrug resistant (MDR) [2]. In Micrococcus luteus cells, carminomycin induced one-thread breaks in DNA. In mutant strain DB-7 of M. luteus, carminomycin was more difficult to induce the one-thread breaks, suggesting that UV-endonuclease was probably involved in reparation of the DNA damages induced by carminomycin [3].
In DBA/2 mice with leukemia L-1210, carminomycin (1.5 mg/kg) inhibited the lymphoma colonies by 50% [4].
References:
[1]. Brazhnikova MG, Zbarsky VB, Ponomarenko VI, et al. Physical and chemical characteristics and structure of carminomycin, a new antitumor antibiotic. J Antibiot (Tokyo), 1974, 27(4): 254-259.
[2]. Tevyashova AN, Shtil AA, Olsufyeva EN, et al. Carminomycin, 14-hydroxycarminomycin and its novel carbohydrate derivatives potently kill human tumor cells and their multidrug resistant variants. J Antibiot (Tokyo), 2004, 57(2): 143-150.
[3]. Trenin AS. Carminomycin induction of single-stranded DNA breaks in Micrococcus luteus cells. Antibiotiki, 1979, 24(11): 841-846.
[4]. Berezina TA, Uteshev BS. Comparative characteristics of the antitumor and immunodepressive activity of carminomycin on the L-1210 experimental model. Antibiotiki, 1979, 24(10): 767-771.