Mimosine prevents the death of glucose-deprived immunostimulated astrocytes by scavenging peroxynitrite

Immunostimulated astrocytes become highly vulnerable to glucose deprivation (Choi and Kim: J Neurosci Res 54:870–875, 1998a). The increased vulnerability is caused by the enhanced level of peroxynitrite endogenously produced in glucose‐deprived immunostimulated astrocytes. In the present study, we report that the plant amino acid mimosine can attenuate the increased death by scavenging peroxynitrite. Treatment with mimosine blocked the increase of nitrotyrosine immunoreactivity, a marker of peroxynitrite, in glucose‐deprived immunostimulated astrocytes. Furthermore, mimosine directly inhibited the nitration of tyrosine residues of bovine serum albumin and the oxidation of dihydrorhodamine‐123 to rhodamine‐123 by peroxynitrite. Mimosine has been used experimentally as a cell cycle G1/S phase transition blocker (Lalande: Exp Cell Res 186:332–339, 1990; Hoffman et al.: Cytometry 12:26–32, 1991). Flow cytometry analysis, however, showed that the cytoprotective effect of mimosine was not attributed to its inhibition of cell cycle progression. Furthermore, under our experimental conditions, mimosine did not alter the levels of cell cycle regulatory proteins, including p21WAF1/CIP1, cyclins D1 and E, and proliferating cell nuclear antigen. In addition, cyclin‐dependent kinase inhibitors olomoucine and roscovitine did not block the increased death. These results indicate that mimosine inhibits the augmented death of glucose‐deprived immunostimulated astrocytes by scavenging peroxynitrite rather than suppressing the cell cycle progression. GLIA 39:37–46, 2002. © 2002 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.