The Effects of Piperine on Rodent Sarcomere Muscle Contraction Using Synchrotron X-Ray Diffraction
Authors:
- Students:
- Lindsay Aceremo
- Malik Adi
- Abdulmonem Akili
- Ash Argueta
- Harrison Brandt
- Marcel Duda
- Andrea Midnight
- Erhan Osmani
- Teachers:
- Chris Repa
- Mentors:
- Thomas Irving (Illinois Institute of Technology, Advanced Photon Source, Biophysics Collaborative Access Team)
- Weikang Ma (Illinois Institute of Technology, Advanced Photon Source, Biophysics Collaborative Access Team)
Advanced Photon Source Sector 18: BioCAT
Piperine is the alkaloid responsible for the pungency of black pepper and long pepper. Despite its use in some forms of traditional medicine, Piperine is not classified as a drug, and has yet to be FDA approved. Piperine has been shown to destabilize the super-relaxed state (SRX) in rabbit fast-twitch fibers but not slow muscles. In other words, it serves as an activator to the muscle fibers resulting in a state of moving disorder. Myosin, a fiber released simultaneously with Actin, which indicates muscular movement, uses very little ATP in the SRX state. If it is released to a disordered relaxed state (DRX), which is the turnover state of myosin in the absence of Actin, Piperine uses much more ATP. For this reason, it may be a possible treatment for obesity by increasing energy use in muscles, thus resulting in the burning of excess fat.