Boldine action against the stannous chloride effect

Peumus boldus extract has been used in popular medicine in the treatment of biliar litiase, hepatic insufficiency and liver congestion. Its effects ar e associated to the substance boldine that is present in its extract. In th e present work, we evaluated the influence of boldine both in: (i) the stru ctural conformation of a plasmid pUC 9.1 through gel electrophoresis analys is; and in (ii) the survival of the strain of Escherichia coli AB1157 submi tted to reactive oxygen species (ROS), generated by a Fenton like reaction, induced by stannous chloride. Our results show a reduction of the lethal e ffect induced by stannous chloride on the survival of the E. coli culture i n the presence of boldine. The supercoiled form of the plasmid is not modif ied by stannous chloride in the presence of boldine. We suggest that the pr otection induced by boldine could be explained by its anti-oxidant mechanis m. In this way, the boldine could be reacting with stannous ions, protectin g them against the oxidation and, consequently, avoiding the generation of ROS. (C) 1999 Elsevier Science Ireland Ltd. All rights reserved.