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In vitro antifungal activity of Shikonin against Candida albicans by inducing cellular apoptosis and necrosis

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Abstract

Background

Our previous studies showed that Shikonin (SK) had a strong anti-Candida albican (C. albicans) activity, especially against some fluconazole-resistant strains, which is probably due to the oxidative damage of SK to C. albicans.

Methods and results

In this study, we expanded the antifungal spectrum and evaluate the toxicity of SK. The results indicated that SK also exhibited potent invitro antifungal activities against other pathogenic fungi such as other Candida, Aspergillus, Cryptococcus, and Dermatophytes, but did not display apparent toxicity to the mammalian cells, suggesting that SK is safe to be a potential antifungal drug. Furtherly, we analyze the exact mechanism of SK against C. albicans. We found that SK could induce a series of apoptosis characteristics, including phosphatidylserine externalization, chromatin condensation and fragmentation, decreased cytochrome c oxidase activity as well as caspase activation.

Conclusions

In summary, this study highlighted the antifungal activity and mechanism of SK against C. albicans, providing a potential therapeutic strategy for C. albicans infection.

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Data availability

The datasets used and/or analyzed during the current study are available from the corresponding author on reasonable request.

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Acknowledgements

This work was funded by Science and Technology Project of Hebei Education Department (QN2021004), the Natural Science Foundation of Hebei province (Grant no. H2021406043) and 2021 Research Start-up Fund for High-level Talents of Chengde Medical College (202109).

Funding

This work was funded by Science and Technology Project of Hebei Education Department (QN2021004), the Natural Science Foundation of Hebei province (Grant no. H2021406043) and 2021 Research Start-up Fund for High-level Talents of Chengde Medical College (202109).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. School of Basic Medicine, Chengde Medical University, Chengde, Hebei, China

    Chong Pang, Jianshuang Chen, Shuangyan Liu & Hao Miao

  2. Shanghai Skin Disease Hospital, School of Medicine, Tongji University, Shanghai, China

    Yingying Cao

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  1. Chong Pang
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  2. Jianshuang Chen
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Contributions

All authors contributed to the study conception and design. Material preparation, data collection and analysis were performed by CP, YC, JC, SL and HM. The first draft of the manuscript was written by HM and CP, the revison manuscript was written by YC and HM. All authors commented on previous versions of the manuscript. All authors read and approved the final manuscript.

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Correspondence to Yingying Cao or Hao Miao.

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Pang, C., Chen, J., Liu, S. et al. In vitro antifungal activity of Shikonin against Candida albicans by inducing cellular apoptosis and necrosis. Mol Biol Rep 50, 1079–1087 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11033-022-08093-7

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