XXII. BIOCHEMICKÝ ZJAZD - Jesseniova lekárska fakulta

Posters
100.
BIOTraNSformaTION of SELECTED aNTHELMINTICS IN raT
taPEWOrm HYMENOLEPIS DIMINUTa
Hana Bártíková, Jana Firbasová, Ivan Vokřál, Lenka Skálová, Jiří Lamka,
Vladimír Kubíček and Barbora Szotáková
Faculty of Pharmacy, Charles University, Hradec Králové, Czech Republic
In all organisms, drug metabolising enzymes (DME) serve as an efficient defence against
the potential negative action of xenobiotics. While human and mammalian DME have
been intensively studied for many years, DME of helminth parasites have been relatively
little investigated so far in spite of the fact that helminth´ DME can preserve the parasite
against the anthelmintic drug and could contribute to drug-resistance development. The
present project was designed to evaluate DME activities in rat tapeworm (Hymenolepis
diminuta), This tapeworm, infecting mammals and causing hymenolepiasis, is often used
as model species for investigation into Cestodes as the life cycle of H. diminuta is relatively
simple, involves rodents (rats primarily) as the definitive host and beetles (Tribolium or
Tenebrio) as the intermediate host. The implementation of H. Diminuta breeding was
the first task of our project. Rats were experimentally infected with H. diminuta cysticercoids
obtained from T. molitor and then adult worms were collected from rat small
intestine. Activities of oxidation enzymes, carbonyl-reducing enzymes and conjugation
enzymes were tested in subcellular fractions of H. diminuta homogenate. The results
showed the ability of H. diminuta enzymes to reduce effectively the carbonyl group of
xenobiotics, e.g. anthelmintics flubendazole and mebendazole. Catalase, peroxidases,
UDP-glucuronosyl transferase and glutathione-S-transferase activities were detected as
well. These results document the ability of H. diminuta to detoxify different xenobiotics
including certain anthelmintics.
Acknowledgements: This project was supported by the Czech Science Foundation, grant
No. P502/10/0217 and by SVV-2010-261-003.
XXII. Biochemistry Congress, Martin
225