Ultra high performance liquid chromatography with synapt high-definition mass spectrometry and a pattern recognition approach to characterize chemical constituents and rat metabolites after the oral administration ofPhellinus igniarius

Anti-Gout Effects of the Medicinal Fungus Phellinus igniarius in Hyperuricaemia and Acute Gouty Arthritis Rat Models

Background:Phellinus igniarius (P. igniarius) is an important medicinal and edible fungus in China and other Southeast Asian countries and has diverse biological activities. This study was performed to comparatively investigate the therapeutic effects of wild and cultivated P. igniarius on hyperuricaemia and gouty arthritis in rat models.

Methods: UPLC-ESI-qTOF-MS was used to identify the chemical constituents of polyphenols from wild P. igniarius (WPP) and cultivated P. igniarius (CPP). Furthermore, WPP and CPP were evaluated in an improved hyperuricaemia rat model induced by yeast extract, adenine and potassium oxonate, which was used to examine xanthine oxidase (XO) activity inhibition and anti-hyperuricemia activity. WPP and CPP therapies for acute gouty arthritis were also investigated in a monosodium urate (MSU)-induced ankle swelling model. UHPLC-QE-MS was used to explore the underlying metabolic mechanisms of P. igniarius in the treatment of gout.

Results: The main active components of WPP and CPP included protocatechuic aldehyde, hispidin, davallialactone, phelligridimer A, hypholomine B and inoscavin A as identified by UPLC-ESI-qTOF-MS. Wild P. igniarius and cultivated P. igniarius showed similar activities in reducing uric acid levels through inhibiting XO activity and down-regulating the levels of UA, Cr and UN, and they had anti-inflammatory activities through down-regulating the secretions of ICAM-1, IL-1β and IL-6 in the hyperuricaemia rat model. The pathological progression of kidney damage was also reversed. The polyphenols from wild and cultivated P. igniarius also showed significant anti-inflammatory activity by suppressing the expression of ICAM-1, IL-1β and IL-6 and by reducing the ankle joint swelling degree in an MSU-induced acute gouty arthritis rat model. The results of metabolic pathway enrichment indicated that the anti-hyperuricemia effect of WPP was mainly related to the metabolic pathways of valine, leucine and isoleucine biosynthesis and histidine metabolism. Additionally, the anti-hyperuricemia effect of CPP was mainly related to nicotinate and nicotinamide metabolism and beta-alanine metabolism.

Conclusions: Wild P. igniarius and cultivated P. igniarius both significantly affected the treatment of hyperuricaemia and acute gouty arthritis models in vivo and therefore may be used as potential active agents for the treatment of hyperuricaemia and acute gouty arthritis.

Screening anti-gout compounds from Phellinus igniarius by ultrafiltration liquid chromatography mass spectrometry based on evaluation of an in vitro method combined with enzymatic reaction

In the present study, the anti-inflammation effect of Phellinus igniarius extract was detected on an in vitro model of RAW 264.7 cells stimulated using sodium urate. In this cell model, the content changes of inflammatory cytokines, intercellular adhesion molecule-1, and interleukin-1 beta, in cell culture supernatants were detected using an enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay. The xanthine oxidase inhibitory activity of P. igniarius extracts was determined using a microplate reader. Furthermore, in order to identify the active compounds of P. igniarius, ultrafiltration liquid chromatography mass spectrometry was utilized to screen xanthine oxidase inhibitors from the extract. Our results showed that in the presence of P. igniarius extract, the expressions of interleukin-1 beta and intercellular adhesion molecule-1 decreased (p < 0.01 and p < 0.05, respectively) compared to that in the control group. The extract effective inhibited the xanthine oxidase activity. Finally, seven compounds were screened and identified as potential xanthine oxidase inhibitors from P. igniarius. Taken together, these results demonstrate a potential anti-inflammation bioactivity of P. igniarius in vitro, providing a basis for further in vivo research for the prevention and treatment of gout.

Metabolomics study of the hepatoprotective effect of Phellinus igniarius in chronic ethanol-induced liver injury mice using UPLC-Q/TOF-MS combined with ingenuity pathway analysis

BACKGROUND

Phellinus igniarius (L.) Quèl as a potential medicinal mushroom possesses multiple biological activities including hepatoprotection, but the hepatoprotective mechanism is not clear.

PURPOSE

To elucidate the hepatoprotective effect and potential target of P. igniarius.

METHODS

The male C57BL/6 mice were fed with the Lieber-DeCarli diet containing alcohol or isocaloric maltose dextrin as control diet with or without P. igniarius decoction (PID) in the dosage of 0.65 g/kg and 2.6 g/kg. The levels of serum biomarkers were detected by an automatic biochemistry analyser. The histopathological changes of liver were observed by hematoxylin and eosin (H&E) staining. Ultra performance liquid chromatography-quadrupole/time-of-flight mass spectrometry (UPLC-Q/TOF-MS) was applied for investigating the dynamic changes of serum metabolites in chronic ethanol-induced liver injury mice and after treatment with PID. Ingenuity pathway analysis (IPA) was employed to identify the potential target of PID.

RESULTS

PID could significantly reduce the levels of alanine aminotransferase (ALT), aspartate aminotransferase (AST), triglyceride (TG) and total bile acid (TBA) in serum and improved hepatic steatosis and inflammation. In terms of metabolism, a total of 36 serum differential metabolites were identified, and PID intervention regulated 24 of them, involving the key metabolic pathways such as the biosynthesis of unsaturated fatty acids, primary bile acid biosynthesis, glycerophospholipid metabolism, fatty acids biosynthesis, ether lipid metabolism and arachidonic acid metabolism. On the mechanism, IPA showed that farnesol X receptor (FXR) was the major potential target for PID, and PID could improve chronic alcohol intake induced by the inhibition of mRNA expression of FXR in the liver and the activation of mRNA expression of FXR in the intestine in mice.

CONCLUSION

The present study for the first time systematically illustrated the hepatoprotective effect of P. igniarius and preliminarily explored its potential target FXR. P. igniarius might be exploited as a promising therapeutic option for alcoholic liver injury.

Sesquiterpenes from cultures of the fungus Phellinus igniarius and their Cytotoxicities

Four new sesquiterpenoids, phellinignins A-D (1-4), together with four known ones (5-8), were isolated from cultures of the fungus Phellinus igniarius. The structures were established by extensive spectroscopic methods including MS, NMR, and the single crystal X-ray diffraction. Compounds 1-3 and 5-8 are tremulane sesquiterpenoids, while compound 4 possesses a new carbon skeleton that might derive from an illudane framework. Compounds 1, 2, 4, and 5 showed certain cytotoxicities to three human cancer cell lines.

A Combined Phytochemistry and Network Pharmacology Approach to Reveal the Potential Antitumor Effective Substances and Mechanism of Phellinus igniarius

Phellinus igniarius (P. igniarius) is a medicinal fungus that is widely used in East Asia for the adjuvant treatment of cancer. To elucidate the antitumor effective substances and mechanism of P. igniarius, we designed an approach incorporating cytotoxicity screening, phytochemical analysis, network pharmacology construction, and cellular and molecular experiments. The dichloromethane extract of P. igniarius (DCMPI) was identified as the active portion in HT-29 cells. Nineteen constituents were identified, and 5 were quantified by UPLC-ESI-Q/TOF-MS. Eight ingredients were obtained in the network pharmacology study. In total, 473 putative targets associated with DCMPI and 350 putative targets related to colon cancer were derived from online databases and target prediction tools. Protein-protein interaction networks of drug and disease putative targets were constructed, and 84 candidate targets were identified based on topological features. Pathway enrichment analysis showed that the candidate targets were mostly related to reactive oxygen species (ROS) metabolic processes and intrinsic apoptotic pathways. Then, a cellular experiment was used to validate the drug-target mechanisms predicted by the system pharmacology analysis. Experimental results showed that DCMPI increased intracellular ROS levels and induced HT-29 cell apoptosis. Molecular biology experiments indicated that DCMPI not only increased Bax and Bad protein expression and promoted PARP and caspase-3/9 cleavage but also down-regulated Bcl-2 and Bcl-xl protein levels to induce apoptosis in HT-29 cells. In conclusion, our study provides knowledge on the chemical composition and antitumor mechanism of P. igniarius, which may be exploited as a promising therapeutic option for colon cancer.

Simultaneous Quantification of Antioxidant Compounds in Phellinus igniarius Using Ultra Performance Liquid Chromatography-Photodiode Array Detection-Electrospray Ionization Tandem Mass Spectrometry

Natural antioxidants are widely used in the life sciences. Phellinus igniarius is a historically used natural antioxidant containing a variety of active compounds. Phenols, particularly Inoscavin A and Hypholomine B, are found in the high concentrations. Better quantitative methods are needed to perform quality control in order to support further research of this mushroom. An ultra-performance liquid chromatography method coupled to photodiode-array detection and an electrospray ionization tandem mass spectrometry method (UPLC-PAD-MS) was developed to simultaneously quantify Inoscavin A and Hypholomine B levels in the medicinal fungus Phellinus igniarius. The two compounds were quantified using UPLC-PAD and UPLC-MS. The methods were accurate (mean accuracy for spiked matrix ranged from 101.5% to 105.8%), sensitive (limit of detection ranged from 0.28 to 1.14 mg L-1) and precise (the relative standard deviations ranged from 0.13 to 2.8%). Inoscavin A and Hypholomine B were purified using high-speed counter-current chromatography (HSCCC), structural evaluated to meet the request of standard substances. UPLC separation was performed on a reversed-phase C18 column using gradient elution with acetonitrile and 0.1% formic acid over 10 min. The developed method was successfully applied to determine Inoscavin A and Hypholomine B in twelve Phellinus igniarius samples of different origins and the results showed that it was suitable for the analysis of these active components in Phellinus igniarius samples.

Five-descriptor model to predict the chromatographic sequence of natural compounds

Despite the recent introduction of mass detection techniques, ultraviolet detection is still widely applied in the field of the chromatographic analysis of natural medicines. Here, a neural network cascade model consisting of nine small artificial neural network units was innovatively developed to predict the chromatographic sequence of natural compounds by integrating five molecular descriptors as the input. A total of 117 compounds of known structure were collected for model building. The order of appearance of each compound was determined in gradient chromatography. Strong linear correlation was found between the predicted and actual chromatographic position orders (Spearman's rho = 0.883, p < 0.0001). Application of the model to the external validation set of nine natural compounds was shown to dramatically increase the prediction accuracy of the real chromatographic order of multiple compounds. A case study shows that chromatographic sequence prediction based on a neural network cascade facilitated compound identification in the chromatographic fingerprint of Radix Salvia miltiorrhiza. For natural medicines of known compound composition, our method provides a feasible means for identifying the constituents of interest when only ultraviolet detection is available.

Characterization and Quantification by LC-MS/MS of the Chemical Components of the Heating Products of the Flavonoids Extract in Pollen Typhae for Transformation Rule Exploration

The Traditional Chinese Medicine herbs Pollen Typhae and Pollen Typhae Carbonisatus have been used as a hemostatic medicine promoting blood clotting for thousands of years. In this study, a reliable, highly sensitive method based on LC-MS/MS has been developed for differentiation of the heating products of total flavonoids in Pollen Typhae (FPT-N). Twenty three peaks were detected and 18 peaks have been structurally identified by comparing retention times, high resolution mass spectrometry data, and fragment ions with those of the reference substances and/or literature data. Additionally, 15 compounds have been quantified by multiple reaction monitoring in the negative ionization mode. It was found that the contents of the characterized compounds differed greatly from each other in FPT-N samples. Among them, the content of huaicarbon B significantly increased at first, while it decreased after heating for 25 min, which could be considered as the characteristic component for distinguishing FPT-N. The present study provided an approach to rapidly distinguish the differences of FPT-N samples. In addition, the actively summarized characteristic fragmentation might help deducing the structure of unknown flavonols compounds. Furthermore, transformation rules of flavonoids during the heating process in carbonisatus development could contribute to hemostatic therapeutic component exploration.