Modified Shoutai Pill inhibited ferroptosis to alleviate recurrent pregnancy loss

Modified Shoutai Pill, also called Jianwei Shoutai Pill (JSP), is a traditional Chinese medicine prescription that has been used as an effective agent for the treatment of miscarriage.

To explore the potential molecular mechanism of JSP against recurrent pregnancy loss (RPL).

In vivo, CBA/J mated DBA/2 mice were used to conduct RPL model, while CBA/J mated BALB/c mice were seen as the control group. Mice were orally administered with JSP, Fer-1 (a ferroptosis inhibitor) or distilled water from day 0.5-12.5 of gestation (GD 0.5-12.5). Pregnancy outcomes were analyzed and ferroptosis related indexes of the whole implantation sites were measured on GD 12.5. In vitro, human trophoblast cell line HTR-8/SVneo was cultured and treated with RAS-selective lethal small molecule 3 (RSL3) (a ferroptosis agonist) or different concentrations of JSP. Then, ferroptosis related indexes were tested to analyze whether JSP could inhibit ferroptosis in HTR-8/SVneo cells.

In vivo consequences demonstrated that JSP or Fer-1 alleviated pregnancy outcomes including lower resorption rate and abortion rate. In addition, excessive iron accumulation and MDA level were inhibited, while GSH and GPX content were raised under JSP or Fer-1 exposure. Also, JSP or Fer-1 enhanced protein expressions of GPX4 and SLC7A11 which suppress ferroptosis, and lightened protein expression of ACSL4 which boosts ferroptosis. In vitro, JSP rescued HTR-8/SVneo cell death and migration ability that were injured by RSL3. Furthermore, JSP inhibited RSL3-induced intracellular reactive oxygen species (ROS), lipid ROS and iron deposition.

Collectively, our findings illustrated that the mechanism of JSP in treating RPL might be related to inhibiting ferroptosis, which provided a novel insight into the application of JSP in RPL intervention.