Assessment of the Effect of Arbutin Isomers and Kojic Acid on Melanin Production, Tyrosinase Activity, and Tyrosinase Expression in B16-4A5 and HMV-II Melanoma Cells

Abstract

The inhibitory effects of α -arbutin, β -arbutin, and kojic acid on melanogenesis, tyrosinase activity, and tyrosinase protein expression in mouse melanoma cells (B16-4A5) and human melanoma cells (HMV-II) were directly compared. β -Arbutin showed a stronger inhibitory effect on melanogenesis and tyrosinase expression in B16-4A5 cells than α -arbutin and kojic acid. Kojic acid showed a stronger inhibitory effect on mushroom and B16-4A5 tyrosinase activity than α -arbutin and β -arbutin. In contrast, kojic acid inhibited all of these effects more strongly than α -arbutin or β -arbutin in HMV-II cells. These results suggest that kojic acid may be used as a positive control for the inhibitory melanogenesis assay, and for tyrosinase activity and tyrosinase expression assays that use HMV-II cells. Moreover, using HMV-II cells with kojic acid as the positive control may facilitate the search for new skin-whitening agents using natural products and provide an alternative to the B16-4A5 assay.