ArticleInternational journal of molecular sciences2020
The Surprising Effect of Phenformin on Cutaneous Darkening and Characterization of Its Underlying Mechanism by a Forward Chemical Genetics Approach.
Article in International journal of molecular sciences, 2020. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 3 papers.
What it found
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The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
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Who cites it
3 citing papers in PubMed, 5 citations in OpenAlex.
- Dietary Interventions, Supplements, and Plant-Derived Compounds for Adjunct Vitiligo Management: A Review of the Literature.Nutrients · 2025Review
- Multimodal analyses of vitiligo skin identify tissue characteristics of stable disease.JCI insight · 2022Article
- Autophagy Declines with Premature Skin Aging resulting in Dynamic Alterations in Skin Pigmentation and Epidermal Differentiation.International journal of molecular sciences · 2020Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
11 authors at 3 institutions in 1 country.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Melanin in the epidermis is known to ultimately regulate human skin pigmentation. Recently, we exploited a phenotypic-based screening system composed of ex vivo human skin cultures to search for effective materials to regulate skin pigmentation. Since a previous study reported the potent inhibitory effect of metformin on melanogenesis, we evaluated several biguanide compounds. The unexpected effect of phenformin, once used as an oral anti-diabetic drug, on cutaneous darkening motivated us to investigate its underlying mechanism utilizing a chemical genetics approach, and especially to identify alternatives to phenformin because of its risk of severe lactic acidosis. Chemical pull-down assays with phenformin-immobilized beads were performed on lysates of human epidermal keratinocytes, and subsequent mass spectrometry identified 7-dehydrocholesterol reductase (DHCR7). Consistent with this, AY9944, an inhibitor of DHCR7, was found to decrease autophagic melanosome degradation in keratinocytes and to intensely darken skin in ex vivo cultures, suggesting the involvement of cholesterol biosynthesis in the metabolism of melanosomes. Thus, our results validated the combined utilization of the phenotypic screening system and chemical genetics as a new approach to develop promising materials for brightening/lightening and/or tanning technologies.
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Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.