Swainsonine

Warning

H302 (100%): Harmful if swallowed [Warning Acute toxicity, oral]

P261, P264, P270, P271, P280, P301+P317, P302+P352, P304+P340, P317, P321, P330, P362+P364, and P501 (click each P-code to see the statement)

Aggregated GHS information provided per 39 reports by companies from 2 notifications to the ECHA C&L Inventory. Each notification may be associated with multiple companies.

The presence of phytotoxins in plants constitutes a health risk for herbivores, particularly on ruminants who accidently consume them. Among the adverse effects produced by these exposures are reproductive alterations, represented by abortion, infertility, and morphological alterations in neonates, which are frequently attributed to other causes. While in some cases the plants that contain such metabolites are known, other times they are not, leading to alterations that are difficult to treat considering that their toxicodynamics are unknown.

Swainsonine causes a variety of neurological disorders, including locoism and "slobbers syndrome" in livestock. In man it causes a lysosomal storage disease, biochemically and morphologically similar to mannosidosis. It is also an appetite suppressant. (L1248, A3092, A3093)

Swainsonine inhibits the activity of glycoside hydrolases, especially N-linked glycosylation. Inhibition of Golgi mannosidase II and other alpha-mannosidases causes the accumulation of atypical hybrid glycoproteins and oligosaccarides because the proper processing cannot occur. This also results in intracellular vacuolization. (L1248, A3092, A3093)

Tridolgosir competitively inhibits the alpha manosidase II (alphaMII), which processes N linked carbohydrates of newly synthesized glycoproteins passing through the Golgi apparatus to the cell surface. Highly branched carbohydrate structures are created which bind to Lectin-phytohemagglutinin (L-PHA) and are subsequently expressed in different tumor types which results in metastatic phenotype, which is correlated with an increased aggressiveness in animals and causes other human malignancies. Inhibition of alphaMII reduces carbohydrates that bind to L-PHA, reducing aggressiveness, metastatic phenotype cells, slows tumor growth, and increases“hybrid type” carbohydrates on the cell surface. Hybrid type carbohydrates may increase cytokine activation of lymphocytes, increasing tumor susceptibility to lymphokine activated and natural killer cells.

Locoweed contains the indolizidine alkaloid swainsonine. Livestock that consume locoweed can suffer from locoism. The toxic component in locoweed has been identified as swainsonine. Swainsonine inhibits lysosomal a-mannosidase and mannosidase II, resulting in altered oligosaccharide degradation and incomplete glycoprotein processing. Endophytic fungi producing swainsonine have been isolated from a variety of locoweed, and these fungi and locoweed have a close relationship, e.g., endophytic fungi can promote the growth of locoweed and increase swainsonine production. Livestock that consume locoweed exhibit several symptoms, including dispirited behavior, staggering gait, chromatopsia, trembling, ataxia, and cellular vacuolar degeneration of most tissues.

Substances that augment, stimulate, activate, potentiate, or modulate the immune response at either the cellular or humoral level. The classical agents (Freund's adjuvant, BCG, Corynebacterium parvum, et al.) contain bacterial antigens. Some are endogenous (e.g., histamine, interferon, transfer factor, tuftsin, interleukin-1). Their mode of action is either non-specific, resulting in increased immune responsiveness to a wide variety of antigens, or antigen-specific, i.e., affecting a restricted type of immune response to a narrow group of antigens. The therapeutic efficacy of many biological response modifiers is related to their antigen-specific immunoadjuvanticity.

Agents obtained from higher plants that have demonstrable cytostatic or antineoplastic activity.

Compounds or agents that combine with an enzyme in such a manner as to prevent the normal substrate-enzyme combination and the catalytic reaction.