Microwave-assisted synthesis, structure and anti-tumor activity of selenized Artemisia sphaerocephala polysaccharide.

In this work, selenylation of Artemisia sphaerocephala polysaccharide (SeASP) was studied by using HSeO/HNO/BaCl reaction system in microwave field. SeASP exhibited the Se content range of 111-264μg/g with high yields (72.1-94.9%). C NMR results indicated that the weak C-6 substitution was occurred. The decrease (from 7.348×10g/mol to 1.736-4.667×10g/mol) in weight average molecular mass (M) of SeASP was observed in size exclusion chromatography combined with multi angle laser light scattering (SEC-MALLS) analysis. SeASP exhibited a more rigid solution conformation which might be due to the degradation of polysaccharide chains in acidic reaction reagent. This was also supported by atomic force microscopy (AFM) result that SeASP showed short chains and island-like topography. In anti-tumor activity assays, SeASP exhibited the inhibition rates of 32.381% and 39.776% against human non-small cell lung cancer cell line (H1650) at the concentration of 100 and 200μg/mL, respectively. The relatively weak inhibition effect of SeASP was not related to cell apoptosis and cell cycle arrest, suggesting Se content might be a key factor to influence the anti-tumor activities of selenized polysaccharides in vitro.