Protective effect of lipoic acid against hydrogen peroxide in yeast cells

Lipoic acid (LA) is found in all kinds of cells, it is widely used in medicine and as a dietary supplement, and it is involved in different physiological functions. Even if there are many papers regarding therapeutic effects of LA, medical research does not always support its effectiveness and little is known about LA metabolism in eukaryotic cells. In this work the probable protective effect of LA was investigated employing five strains of yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae through short term assays. In particular LA behaviour in oxidative stress conditions was studied. For this purpose hydrogen peroxide was used as oxidant. In D7 strain, LA showed antimutagenic effects against hydrogen peroxide and decreased significantly cytochrome P450. To better elucidate the effect of LA the following yeast strains carrying deletions in superoxide dismutase genes (SOD) were employed: EG-103 (wild type), EG-110 strain (without mytochondrial SOD), EG-118 (without cytoplasmatic SOD) and EG-133 (without both enzymes). LA increased the number of mitotic divisions in EG-103, EG-110 and EG-133 and in growing cells (EG-103, EG-110, EG-118) it increased survival percentage with respect to hydrogen peroxide. The positive action was evident in D7 and in EG strains and it showed that LA can be protective and antimutagenic against oxidants in yeast cells, via its antioxidant activity. (C) 2003 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.