Multivariate chromatographic fingerprint preparation and authentication of plant material from the genus Bauhinia

Chemometric profile, antioxidant and tyrosinase inhibitory activity of Camel's foot creeper leaves (Bauhinia vahlii)

The present study is the first effort to a comprehensive evaluation of antityrosinase activity and chemometric analysis of Bauhinia vahlii. The experimental results revealed that the methanol extract of Bauhinia vahlii (BVM) possesses higher polyphenolic compounds and total antioxidant activity than those reported elsewhere for other more conventionally and geographically different varieties. The BVM contain saturated fatty acids such as hexadecanoic acid (10.15%), octadecanoic acid (1.97%), oleic acid (0.61%) and cis-vaccenic acid (2.43%) along with vitamin E (12.71%), α-amyrin (9.84%), methyl salicylate (2.39%) and β-sitosterol (17.35%), which were mainly responsible for antioxidant as well as tyrosinase inhibitory activity. Tyrosinase inhibitory activity of this extract was comparable to that of Kojic acid. These findings suggested that the B. vahlii leaves could be exploited as potential source of natural antioxidant and tyrosinase inhibitory agent, as well.

Liver injury from herbal and dietary supplements

Herbal and dietary supplements (HDS) are used increasingly both in the United States and worldwide, and HDS-induced liver injury in the United States has increased proportionally. Current challenges in the diagnosis and management of HDS-induced liver injury were the focus of a 2-day research symposium sponsored by the American Association for the Study of Liver Disease and the National Institutes of Health. HDS-induced liver injury now accounts for 20% of cases of hepatotoxicity in the United States based on research data. The major implicated agents include anabolic steroids, green tea extract, and multi-ingredient nutritional supplements. Anabolic steroids marketed as bodybuilding supplements typically induce a prolonged cholestatic but ultimately self-limiting liver injury that has a distinctive serum biochemical as well as histological phenotype. Green tea extract and many other products, in contrast, tend to cause an acute hepatitis-like injury. Currently, however, the majority of cases of HDS-associated liver injury are due to multi-ingredient nutritional supplements, and the component responsible for the toxicity is usually unknown or can only be suspected. HDS-induced liver injury presents many clinical and research challenges in diagnosis, identification of the responsible constituents, treatment, and prevention. Also important are improvements in regulatory oversight of nonprescription products to guarantee their constituents and ensure purity and safety. The confident identification of injurious ingredients within HDS will require strategic alignments among clinicians, chemists, and toxicologists. The ultimate goal should be to prohibit or more closely regulate potentially injurious ingredients and thus promote public safety. (Hepatology 2017;65:363-373).

Expeditious discrimination of four species of the Panax genus using direct infusion-MS/MS combined with multivariate statistical analysis

A practical approach based on direct infusion-MS/MS (DI-MS/MS) was demonstrated for metabolomic classification of four species in the Panax genus. The species Panax ginseng, Panax notoginseng, Panax quinquefolius and Panax vietnamensis were analyzed to develop an efficient tool for authenticating ginseng. Four target ions (m/z 783.5, 945.5, 1107.5 and 1149.2) were selected from LC-MS screening results for DI-MS/MS analysis. The target ions served as classifiers of the four species. As a targeted analysis, DI-MS/MS provided the structural identities of the target ions, clear spectral data and high sensitivity in a shorter time than routine LC-MS analysis. Principal component analysis and partial least squares-discriminant analysis of the DI-MS/MS fingerprinting revealed distinct grouping of the data. The results were validated by cross-validation and a permutation test to examine the utility of the statistical models. The spectral intensities of each species were compared with one another using box plots, which allowed straightforward authentication of the Panax species. The proposed method showed improved efficiency over other current methods for discrimination of large quantities of plant material. Additionally, to the best of our knowledge, this is the first study in which DI-MS/MS has been used to classify plant samples.

Chemometric discrimination of genetically modified Coffea arabica cultivars using spectroscopic and chromatographic fingerprints

Multivariate statistical design and principal component analysis (PCA) applied to RP-HPLC-DAD and FTIR spectroscopic data were performed to investigate the fingerprints of four coffee cultivars, traditional red bourbon and three genetically modified cultivars. The design and response surface results showed that extraction dependence on solvent composition of one of the genetically modified cultivars, IAPAR 59, was very similar to that found for the red bourbon standard. PCA of the FTIR spectra obtained from all the simplex centroid design mixtures indicated that the 1:1 binary ethanol-dichloromethane solution resulted in the best separation of the four cultivars. The IPR 108 cultivar has more intense vibrational bands in the 3200-3,600 cm(-1) and 1100-1,600 cm(-1) regions indicating higher acid and fat levels than those of the other cultivars. The UV absorptions close to 275 nm of the RP-HPLC-DAD spectra are correlated with the strengths of the infrared absorptions between 3400 and 3,460 cm(-1) and can be explained by varying caffeine concentrations in the four cultivars.

Application of chemometrics in authentication of herbal medicines: a review

INTRODUCTION

Herbal medicines (HM) and their preparations have been widely used for hundreds of years all over the world. However, they have not been officially recognised due to a lack of adequate or accepted research methodology for their evaluation.

OBJECTIVE

To present a concise overview of the recent applications of chemometrics in solving the ambiguity of herbal medicine authentication during the last two decades.

METHODOLOGY

Studies involving the applications of chemometric analysis in combination with different analytical methods were classified according to the method of analysis used including chromatographic (HPLC, GC and CE), spectroscopic (NMR, IR, UV and ICP) and genetic analysis (RAPD). The purpose of each of these studies was classified into one of three main categories: taxonomic discrimination, quality assessment or classification between plants of different geographic origins.

RESULTS

This review comprises over 150 studies, covering the past two decades, emphasising the significance of chemometric methods in the discrimination of many herbs from closely related species and from adulterants, based on the principal bioactive components and phytochemical diversity. Furthermore, the differentiation between varieties and hybrids was achieved in addition to the prediction of the active components by quantitative methods of analysis. Discrimination according to geographical origin and localities, processing methods, DNA profiling and metabolomics were also efficiently investigated.

CONCLUSION

Chemometric methods have provided an efficient and powerful tool for the quality control and authentication of different herbs.

The antimicrobial, antioxidative, anti-inflammatory activity and cytotoxicity of different fractions of four South African Bauhinia species used traditionally to treat diarrhoea

ETHNOPHARMACOLOGICAL IMPORTANCE

Many Bauhinia species, including those indigenous to South Africa, are used in traditional medicine across the world for treating ailments such as gastrointestinal tract (GIT) disorders, diabetes, infectious diseases and inflammation.

AIMS

Several relevant aspects of different fractions of leaf extracts of Bauhinia bowkeri (BAB), Bauhinia galpinii (BAG), Bauhinia petersiana (BAP), and Bauhinia variegata (BAV) used in South African traditional medicine to alleviate diarrhoea related symptoms were evaluated.

MATERIALS AND METHODS

The antioxidative activities of the extracts were determined using the 2, 2-diphenyl-1-picrylhydrazyl (DPPH), 2, 2'-azino-bis (3-ethylbenzothiazoline-6-sulphonic acid (ABTS(+)) radical scavenging and ferric reducing antioxidant power (FRAP) methods. In vitro antimicrobial activities of the extracts were determined against bacterial strains (Staphylococcus aureus, Pseudomonas aeruginosa, Escherichia coli and Enterococcus faecalis) and clinical isolates of the opportunistic fungal strains (Aspergillus fumigatus, Candida albicans, and Cryptococcus neoformans) using a serial dilution microplate method. The polyphenolic contents were quantified using standard methods, and anti-inflammatory activities of the crude extracts were determined using the cyclooxygenase and soybean 15-lipoxygenase enzyme inhibitory assays. The safety of the extracts was evaluated by determining the cytotoxicity against Vero cell lines.

RESULTS

The acidified 70% acetone crude extract and their fractions had good antiradical potency against the DPPH and ABTS radicals. The methanol soluble portions of the butanol fractions were more potent (EC(50) ranges from 0.64 ± 0.05 to 1.51 ± 0.07 and 0.88 ± 0.18 to 1.49 ± 0.09 μg/ml against DPPH and ABTS radical respectively) compared to the standard, trolox and ascorbic acid (EC(50) ranges from 1.47 ± 0.24 to 1.70 ± 0.27 μg/ml) for both DPPH and ABTS. The crude extracts contained variable quantities of phenolic content. The crude extracts and their fractions had weak to good antimicrobial activities, inhibiting the growth of the organisms at concentrations ranging from 39 to 2500 μg/ml. The BAG crude extract and its fractions were the most active against the fungi (MICs ranging from 39 to 625 μg/ml) while the BAB extract and its fractions were the least active with the MICs ranging between 39 and 2500 μg/ml. Aspergillus fumigatus was the least susceptible fungus while Cryptococcus neoformans was the most susceptible. The phenolic-rich crude extracts of BAB, BAG, and BAP had moderate to good dose-dependent cyclooxygenase-1 enzyme inhibitory activity with inhibitions between 22.8% and 71.4%. The extracts were however, inactive against cyclooxygenase-2. The extracts had some level of cytotoxicity towards Vero cell lines, reducing cell viability to less than 10% at concentrations more than 50 μg/ml.

CONCLUSION

The biological activities observed in Bauhinia species provide a scientific basis for the use of the plants in traditional medicines to treat diseases with multi-factorial pathogenesis such as diarrhoea, with each aspect of activity contributing to the ultimate therapeutic benefit of the plants. However, the use of the phenolic-rich extracts of these plants to treat diarrhoea or any other ailments in traditional medicine needs to be monitored closely because of potential toxic effects and selective inhibition of COX-1 with the associated GIT injury.

Implementing a "quality by design" approach to assure the safety and integrity of botanical dietary supplements

Natural products have provided a basis for health care and medicine to humankind since the beginning of civilization. According to the World Health Organization (WHO), approximately 80% of the world population still relies on herbal medicines for health-related benefits. In the United States, over 42% of the population claimed to have used botanical dietary supplements to either augment their current diet or to "treat" or "prevent" a particular health-related issue. This has led to the development of a burgeoning industry in the U.S. ($4.8 billion per year in 2008) to supply dietary supplements to the consumer. However, many commercial botanical products are poorly defined scientifically, and the consumer must take it on faith that the supplement they are ingesting is an accurate representation of what is listed on the label, and that it contains the purportedly "active" constituents they seek. Many dietary supplement manufacturers, academic research groups, and governmental organizations are progressively attempting to construct a better scientific understanding of natural products, herbals, and botanical dietary supplements that have co-evolved with Western-style pharmaceutical medicines. However, a deficiency of knowledge is still evident, and this issue needs to be addressed in order to achieve a significant level of safety, efficacy, and quality for commercial natural products. The authors contend that a "quality by design" approach for botanical dietary supplements should be implemented in order to ensure the safety and integrity of these products. Initiating this approach with the authentication of the starting plant material is an essential first step, and in this review several techniques that can aid in this endeavor are outlined.