ArticleBMC bioinformatics2007
Comparison of gene expression profiles altered by comfrey and riddelliine in rat liver.
Article in BMC bioinformatics, 2007. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 11 papers.
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Who cites it
11 citing papers in PubMed, 27 citations in OpenAlex.
- Pyrrolizidine Alkaloid-Induced Hepatotoxicity: A Narrative Review on Molecular Mechanisms and Detoxification Strategies.Antioxidants (Basel, Switzerland) · 2026Review
- Pyrrolizidine alkaloids cause cell cycle and DNA damage repair defects as analyzed by transcriptomics in cytochrome P450 3A4-overexpressing HepG2 clone 9 cells.Cell biology and toxicology · 2022Article
- Toxic phytochemicals and their potential risks for human cancer.Cancer prevention research (Philadelphia, Pa.) · 2015Review
- Methysticin and 7,8-dihydromethysticin are two major kavalactones in kava extract to induce CYP1A1.Toxicological sciences : an official journal of the Society of Toxicology · 2011Article
- Differential transcriptomic profiles effected by oil palm phenolics indicate novel health outcomes.BMC genomics · 2011Article
- Metabolism, genotoxicity, and carcinogenicity of comfrey.Journal of toxicology and environmental health. Part B, Critical reviews · 2010Article
- Genotoxicity of pyrrolizidine alkaloids.Journal of applied toxicology : JAT · 2010Review
- Gene expression profiling as an initial approach for mechanistic studies of toxicity and tumorigenicity of herbal plants and herbal dietary supplements.Journal of environmental science and health. Part C, Environmental carcinogenesis & ecotoxicology reviews · 2010Review
- Analysis of gene expression changes of drug metabolizing enzymes in the livers of F344 rats following oral treatment with kava extract.Food and chemical toxicology : an international journal published for the British Industrial Biological Research Association · 2009Article
- Proceedings of the 2008 MidSouth Computational Biology and Bioinformatics Society (MCBIOS) Conference.BMC bioinformatics · 2008Article
- Proceedings of the Fourth Annual Conference of the MidSouth Computational Biology and Bioinformatics Society.BMC bioinformatics · 2007Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
5 authors at 1 institution in 1 country.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
backgroundComfrey (Symphytum officinale) is a perennial plant and has been consumed by humans as a vegetable, a tea and an herbal medicine for more than 2000 years. It, however, is hepatotoxic and carcinogenic in experimental animals and hepatotoxic in humans. Pyrrolizidine alkaloids (PAs) exist in many plants and many of them cause liver toxicity and/or cancer in humans and experimental animals. In our previous study, we found that the mutagenicity of comfrey was associated with the PAs contained in the plant. Therefore, we suggest that carcinogenicity of comfrey result from those PAs. To confirm our hypothesis, we compared the expression of genes and processes of biological functions that were altered by comfrey (mixture of the plant with PAs) and riddelliine (a prototype of carcinogenic PA) in rat liver for carcinogenesis in this study.
resultsGroups of 6 Big Blue Fisher 344 rats were treated with riddelliine at 1 mg/kg body weight by gavage five times a week for 12 weeks or fed a diet containing 8% comfrey root for 12 weeks. Animals were sacrificed one day after the last treatment and the livers were isolated for gene expression analysis. The gene expressions were investigated using Applied Biosystems Rat Whole Genome Survey Microarrays and the biological functions were analyzed with Ingenuity Analysis Pathway software. Although there were large differences between the significant genes and between the biological processes that were altered by comfrey and riddelliine, there were a number of common genes and function processes that were related to carcinogenesis. There was a strong correlation between the two treatments for fold-change alterations in expression of drug metabolizing and cancer-related genes.
conclusionOur results suggest that the carcinogenesis-related gene expression patterns resulting from the treatments of comfrey and riddelliine are very similar, and PAs contained in comfrey are the main active components responsible for carcinogenicity of the plant.
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