| Article ID | Journal | Published Year | Pages | File Type |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2583423 | Environmental Toxicology and Pharmacology | 2014 | 9 Pages |
•We described a simple method for preparing aqueous extracts from demosponges which allows the extraction of protein compounds.•Protein and glycoprotein profiles of sponge extracts were analyzed.•A test of cytotoxicity allowed to determine the optimal non-toxic doses of each extract, which could be used to study their biological properties.
Marine natural products extracted from sponges represent a new source for drug discovery. Here we describe a simple method for preparing aqueous extracts from 7 Mediterranean demosponges, which allowed the extraction of water-soluble compounds, such as proteins by homogenization of sponge tissue in phosphate buffered saline (PBS).The comparative analysis by SDS-PAGE showed differences in number of bands, bandwidth and intensity among the sponges analyzed. The PAS/silver staining revealed a substantial and different glycoprotein assortment among the demosponges studied.To further study the biological activities present in the sponge extracts, we determined the non-cytotoxic doses on four different mammalian cell types demonstrating that the optimal non-cytotoxic doses were cell type- and extract-dependent.In conclusion, the extraction method described in this paper represents a fast and efficient procedure for the extraction of water-soluble proteins from marine sponges. Furthermore, the cell viability data suggest the feasibility of this method for the direct in vitro cell-based assays.
