Assessment of biological activity of new compounds designated to act as lysosomotropes

This work contains the results of studies on the influence of new lysosomotropic substances on an erythrocyte membrane. The compounds studied were hydrochlorides of N,N-dimethylglycine alkyl esters (DMG-n) and N,N-dimethylalanine alkyl esters (DMAL-n) having two different-length alkyl chains (n = 12 and 16), oxalates of dimethylaminoalaninates (DMALs -n; n = 8, 10, 12, 14 and 16) and methobromides of glycinates and alaninates (DMALM-12 and DMGM-12). They were found to hemolyze erythrocytes, to change their osmotic resistance and to influence erythrocyte membrane fluidity. The results obtained indicate that observed changes were dependent on lipophilicities of the compounds. It was especially evident in the case of hemolytic efficiencies of the homologous series of alanine oxalates. Also, DMG-n and DMAL-n compounds significantly differed in their hemolytic properties. Again, slightly better hemolytic efficiency of DMG compounds in comparison with corresponding compounds having the same alkyl chain, DMAL, confirm such a conclusion. However, their hemolytic efficiencies were found to be moderate, which makes them potentially useful membrane modifiers. That feature is important for lysosomotropic compounds and its confirmation was the primary aim of the presented work. It is worth mentioning that DMGM and DMALM compounds exhibited better hemolytic efficiencies than all other compounds studied – which is probably caused by the fact that they were used as bromides. Bromides are commonly found to be more active than compounds with other counterions.