Chemotherapy Drugs Thiocolchicoside and Taxol Permeabilize Lipid Bilayer Membranes by Forming Ion Pores
Bibliographic record
Abstract
We report ion channel formation by chemotherapy drugs: thiocolchicoside (TCC) and taxol (TXL) which primarily target tubulin but not only. For example, TCC has been shown to interact with GABA A , nuclear envelope and strychnine-sensitive glycine receptors. TXL interferes with the normal breakdown of microtubules inducing mitotic block and apoptosis. It also interacts with mitochondria and found significant chemotherapeutic applications for breast, ovarian and lung cancer. In order to better understand the mechanisms of TCC and TXL actions, we examined their effects on phospholipid bilayer membranes. Our electrophysiological recordings across membranes constructed in NaCl aqueous phases consisting of TCC or TXL under the influence of an applied transmembrane potential (V) indicate that both molecules induce stable ion flowing pores/channels in membranes. Their discrete current versus time plots exhibit triangular shapes which is consistent with a spontaneous time-dependent change of the pore conductance in contrast to rectangular conductance events usually induced by ion channels. These events exhibit conductance (∼0.01-0.1 pA/mV) and lifetimes (∼5-30 ms) within the ranges observed in e.g., gramicidin A and alamethicin channels. The channel formation probability increases linearly with TCC/TXL concentration and V and is not affected by pH (5.7 - 8.4). A theoretical explanation on the causes of chemotherapy drug induced ion pore formation and the pore stability has also been found using our recently discovered binding energy between lipid bilayer and the bilayer embedded ion channels using gramicidin A channels as tools. This picture of energetics suggests that as the channel forming agents approach to the lipids on bilayer the localized charge properties in the constituents of both channel forming agents (e.g., chemotherapy drugs in this study) and the lipids determine the electrostatic drug-lipid coupling energy through screened Coulomb interactions between the drug molecules and lipids. The strength of this electrostatic energetic coupling determines the stability of the drug-induced ion pores. These findings may elucidate cytotoxic effects of chemotherapy drugs and aid in the development of novel drugs for a broad spectrum of cancers and other diseases.
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How this classification was reachedexpand
Full frame machine prediction
Teacher imitationNot calibrated prevalence, not ground truth. Human validation pending. The Gemma side is a direct model label for every work in the frame, read from the title-only record. The Codex side is a classifier learned from the 10,348 direct Codex labels and calibrated to design-weighted sample rates; fields without enough sample support carry no Codex call. Candidate is the union of the two sides; consensus is their intersection. These outputs are machine_predicted_unvalidated and are not human labels.
Distilled classifier scores by category (both heads)
| Category | Codex | Gemma |
|---|---|---|
| Metaresearch | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Meta-epidemiology (narrow) | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Meta-epidemiology (broad) | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Bibliometrics | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Science and technology studies | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Scholarly communication | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Open science | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Research integrity | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Insufficient payload (model declined to judge) | 0.001 | 0.000 |
Machine scores (provisional)
The two teacher heads of the student model, read on this work. A score orders the frame for review; it never asserts a category, and the validation status ships verbatim with every row.
Baseline scores from an immature model (maturity gate not passed, 7 training rounds). Scores rank; they never assert a category.
score_only:v0-immature-baseline · verbatim from the scoring run: score_only means the number may rank works, and no category label ships from itClassification
machine, unvalidatedMachine predicted; a candidate call from one source (direct Gemma or distilled Codex), not a consensus.
How this classification was reached, model by model and score by score, is at the end of the page under "How this classification was reached".