Glutathione in its reduced form (GSH) is an antioxidant and also is involved in pheomelanin formation. Thus, it has been long believed that GSH has a skin whitening effect. However, its actual or direct effect is unproven. We evaluated the anti-melanogenic effects of GSH and its derivatives in vitro. We examined change of melanogenesis and its related proteins by GSH itself and its derivatives, including GSH monoethyl ester (GSH-MEE), GSH diethyl ester (GSH-DEE) and GSH monoisopropyl ester (GSH-MIPE) in Melan-A cells, Mel-Ab cells, and B16F10 cells. GSH and GSH-MEE did not display cytotoxic activity, but GSH-MIPE and GSH-DEE did. Intriguingly, GSH itself had no inhibitory effect on melanin production or intracellular tyrosinase activity. Rather, it was GSH-MEE and GSH-MIPE that profoundly reduced the amount of melanin and intracellular tyrosinase activity. Thus, GSH-MEE was selected as a suitable candidate skin-whitening agent and it did not alter melanogenesis-associated proteins such as microphthalmia-associated transcription factor (MITF), tyrosinase, tyrosinase-related protein (TRP)-1, and TRP-2, but it did increase the amount of suggested pheomelanin and suggested pheomelanin/eumelanin ratio. GSH-MEE was effective for anti-melanogenesis, whereas GSH itself was not. GSH-MEE could be developed as a safe and efficient agent for the treatment of hyperpigmentation skin disorders.

The endoplasmic reticulum (ER) is an organelle in which important cellular events such as protein synthesis and lipid production occur. Although many lipid molecules are produced in the ER, the effect of ER-organizing proteins on lipid synthesis in sebocytes has not been completely elucidated. Tropomyosin-receptor kinase fused gene (TFG) is located in ER exit sites and participates in COPII-coated vesicle formation along with many scaffold proteins, such as Sec. 13 and Sec. 16. In this study, we investigated the putative role of TFG in lipid production in sebocytes using an immortalized human sebocyte line. During IGF-1-induced lipogenesis, the level of the TFG protein was increased in a time- and dose-dependent manner. When TFG was over-expressed using recombinant adenovirus, lipid production in sebocytes was increased along with an up-regulation of the expression of lipogenic regulators, such as PPAR-γ, SREBP-1 and SCD. Conversely, down-regulation of TFG using a microRNA (miR) decreased lipid production and the expression of lipogenic regulators. Based on these data, TFG is a novel regulator of lipid synthesis in sebocytes.

Steroid receptor coactivator-1 (SRC-1) is a transcription coactivator playing a pivotal role in mediating a wide range of signaling pathways by interacting with related transcription factors and nuclear receptors. Aberrantly elevated SRC-1 activity is associated with cancer metastasis and progression, and therefore, suppression of SRC-1 is emerging as a promising therapeutic strategy. In this study, we developed a novel SRC-1 degrader for targeted degradation of cellular SRC-1. This molecule consists of a selective ligand for SRC-1 and a bulky hydrophobic group. Since the hydrophobic moiety on the protein surface could mimic a partially denatured hydrophobic region of a protein, SRC-1 could be recognized as an unfolded protein and experience the chaperone-mediated degradation in the cells through the ubiquitin–proteasome system (UPS). Our results demonstrate that a hydrophobic-tagged chimeric molecule is shown to significantly reduce cellular levels of SRC-1 and suppress cancer cell migration and invasion. Together, these results highlight that our SRC-1 degrader represents a novel class of therapeutic candidates for targeting cancer metastasis. Moreover, we believe that the hydrophobic tagging strategy would be widely applicable to develop peptide-based protein degraders with enhanced cellular activity.