A review on the chemical profiles, quality control, pharmacokinetic and pharmacological properties of Fufang Xueshuantong Capsule

ETHNOPHARMACOLOGICAL RELEVANCE

Fufang Xueshuantong Capsule (FXC) is a traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) formula composed of four herbs including Panax notoginseng, Astragalus membranaceus, Salvia miltiorrhiza, and Scrophularia ningpoensis. Long-term and extensive clinical applications have confirmed that FXC could exert significant effects on fundus, cardiovascular and cerebrovascular occlusive diseases.

AIM OF THE REVIEW

To systematically analyze and summarize the existing researches involving quality and efficacy re-evaluation of FXC, point out the typical problems, and further propose some opinions to contribute to future study.

MATERIALS AND METHODS

Literatures concerning FXC were collected from online scientific databases including China National Knowledge Infrastructure, WanFang Data, PubMed, Science Direct, Scopus, Web of Science, Springer Link up to June 2020. All eligible studies are analyzed and summarized in this review.

RESULTS

This review outlines the chemical profiles, quality control, pharmacokinetic and pharmacological properties of FXC based on reported results. Some problems are pointed out for FXC: the quality control needs further improvement, the pharmacokinetic properties have not been comprehensively investigated, and in-depth and systematic mechanism researches are scarce. Hereon we propose several directions for future study: (a) establishment of feasible HPLC or LC-MS based quantitative methods for simultaneous determination of multiple components to monitor the overall quality; (b) pharmacokinetic studies concerning humans, drug-drug interactions, and correlation with pharmacodynamics; (c) pharmacological mechanism researches integrating multi-omics technologies (gut microbiome, metabolomics, etc.).

CONCLUSIONS

This review highlights the researches on quality and efficacy re-evaluation of FXC, and points out some typical problems. Further in-depth studies should focus on the promotion of quality control, pharmacokinetic properties, and pharmacological mechanism.

Microemulsion Electrokinetic Chromatography

Microemulsion electrokinetic chromatography (MEEKC) is a special mode of capillary electrophoresis employing a microemulsion as carrier electrolyte. Analytes may partition between the aqueous phase of the microemulsion and its oil droplets which act as a pseudostationary phase. The technique is well suited for the separation of neutral species, in which case charged oil droplets (obtained by addition of an anionic or cationic surfactant) are present. A single set of separation parameters may be sufficient for separation of a wide range of analytes belonging to quite different chemical classes. Fine-tuning of resolution and analysis time may be achieved by addition of organic solvents, by changes in the nature of the surfactants (and cosurfactants) used to stabilize the microemulsion, or by various additives that may undergo some additional interactions with the analytes. Besides the separation of neutral analytes (which may be the most important application area of MEEKC), it can also be employed for cationic and/or anionic species. In this chapter, MEEKC conditions are summarized that have proven their reliability for routine analysis. Furthermore, the mechanisms encountered in MEEKC allow an efficient on-capillary preconcentration of analytes, so that the problem of poor concentration sensitivity of ultraviolet absorbance detection is circumvented.

The activity-integrated method for quality assessment of reduning injection by on-line DPPH-CE-DAD

A sensitive on-line DPPH-CE-DAD method was developed and validated for both screening and determining the concentration of seven antioxidants of Reduning injection. The pH and concentrations of buffer solution, SDS, β-CD and organic modifier were studied for the detection of DPPH and seven antioxidants. By on-line mixing DPPH and sample solution, a DPPH-CE method for testing the antioxidant activity of the complex matrix was successfully established and used to screen the antioxidant components of Reduning injection. Then, antioxidant components including caffeic acid, isochlorogenic acid A, isochlorogenic acid B, isochlorogenic acid C, chlorogenic acid, neochlorogenic acid and cryptochlorogenic acid were quantified by the newly established CE-DAD method. Finally, the total antioxidant activity and the multiple active components were selected as markers to evaluate the quality of Reduning injection. The results demonstrated that the on-line DPPH-CE-DAD method was reagent-saving, rapid and feasible for on-line simultaneous determination of total pharmacological activity and contents of multi-components samples. It was also a powerful method for evaluating the quality control and mechanism of action of TCM injection.

Advance of CE and CEC in phytochemical analysis (2012–2013)

This article presents an overview of the advance of CE and CEC in phytochemical analysis, based on the literature not mentioned in our previous review papers [Chen, X. J., Zhao, J., Wang, Y. T., Huang, L. Q., Li, S. P., Electrophoresis 2012, 33, 168–179], mainly covering the years 2012–2013. In this article, attention is paid to online preconcentration, rapid separation, and sensitive detection. Selected examples illustrate the applicability of CE and CEC in biomedical, pharmaceutical, environmental, and food analysis. Finally, some general conclusions and future perspectives are given.

Ionic liquid-based one-step micellar extraction of multiclass polar compounds from hawthorn fruits by ultrahigh-performance liquid chromatography coupled with quadrupole time-of-flight tandem mass spectrometry

An ionic liquid (IL)-based one-step micellar extraction procedure was developed for the extraction of multiclass polar analytes (protocatechuic acid, chlorogenic acid, epicatechin, hyperoside, isoquercitrin, quercetin) from hawthorn fruits and their determination using ultrahigh-performance liquid chromatography coupled with quadrupole time-of-flight tandem mass spectrometry (UHPLC-Q-TOF/MS). Compared to conventional organic solvent extractions, this newly proposed method was much easier, more sensitive, environmentally friendly, and effective as well. Several important parameters influencing the micellar extraction efficiency are discussed, such as selection of ILs, surfactant concentration, and extraction time. Under the optimal conditions, good linearity was achieved for each analyte with correlation coefficients (r(2)) ranging from 0.9934 to 0.9999, and the recovery values ranged from 89.3 to 106% with relative standard deviations lower than 5.5%. Results suggest that the IL-based one-step micellar extraction could be an alternative and promising means in future food analysis.

Analysis of five alkaloids using surfactant-coated multi-walled carbon nanotubes as the pseudostationary phase in nonaqueous capillary electrophoresis

In this paper, surfactant-coated multi-walled carbon nanotubes (SC-MWNTs) have been proposed as a novel pseudostationary phase (PSP) to enhance the separation of isoquinoline alkaloids in nonaqueous capillary electrophoresis (NACE). Several parameters affecting NACE separation were studied including the MWNT concentration, the electrolyte concentration, pH* and the separation voltage. In comparison to conventional NACE, the addition of an MWNT dispersion using surfactant solutions in the electrolyte produced an important enhancement in the resolution due to the π-π interactions between the analytes and the surface of the carbon nanotubes. Using SC-MWNTs (6μgmL(-1)) as a PSP in the background electrolyte (BGE) (i.e., 20mM sodium acetate in methanol-acetonitrile (80:20, v/v)) provided the complete separation of five alkaloids. Finally, the developed method has been successfully applied to the detection and quantification of the tested compounds of Rhizoma Coptidis.