Rapid, reliable, and sensitive detection of adenosine deaminase activity by UHPLC-Q-Orbitrap HRMS and its application to inhibitory activity evaluation of traditional Chinese medicines

Evaluation of raw and processed Phellodendri Chinensis Cortex using the quality marker analysis strategy by UHPLC-Q-Orbitrap MS and multivariate statistical analysis

Introduction: Phellodendri Chinensis Cortex is a necessary part of healthcare for its significant clinical efficacy. Raw and processed Phellodendri Chinensis Cortex is both documented in the Chinese Pharmacopoeia (2015). After processing, the therapeutic effects are believed to differ according to traditional Chinese medicine theories. However, the chemical mechanism responsible for this processing, according to traditional Chinese medicine theories, is still not clear. Methods: In this study, the therapeutic effects of various ions were examined based on traditional Chinese medicine theories by ultra-high performance liquid chromatography-hybrid quadrupole-Orbitrap mass spectrometry (UHPLC-Q-Orbitrap MS) coupled with multivariate statistical analysis, such as principal component analysis (PCA) and orthogonal partial least squares discriminant analysis (OPLS-DA), to comprehensively compare the differences between raw and processed Phellodendri Chinensis Cortex for the first time. Results: A total of 48 compounds were screened, out and 10 of them simultaneously transformed with significant variation in processed products compared with raw materials. It was illustrated that the contents of berberine, palmatine, jatrorrhizine, magnoflorine, menisperine, phellodendrine, tetrahydrojatrorrhizine, and tetrahydropalmatine decreased, while the compounds of berberrubine and fernloylquinic acid methyl ester newly appeared in processed herbs. This is likely to be related to the conversion of ingredients during processing. Discussion: Altogether, the fact that quality markers have been successfully identified to differentiate processed Phellodendri Chinensis Cortex from raw materials suggests that this approach could be used for the investigation of chemical transformation mechanisms involved in the processing of herbal medicine.

A rapid assay to screen adenosine deaminase inhibitors from Ligustri Lucidi Fructus against metabolism of cordycepin utilizing ultra-high-performance liquid chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry

Cordycepin has recently received increased attention owing to its extensive pharmacological activity. Adenosine deaminase (ADA) is widely distributed in mammalian blood and tissues; as a result, cordycepin is quickly metabolized upon entering into the body and converted into the inactive metabolite 3'-deoxyinosine, thus limiting its activity when administered alone. We herein present a novel ultra-high-performance liquid chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry (UHPLC-MS/MS) method for screening ADA inhibitors against the metabolism of cordycepin. Cordycepin and 3'-deoxyinosine were chosen as substrate and product, respectively. A proper separation was achieved for all analytes within 3 min. 3'-Deoxyinosine was quantified in the presence or absence of potential ADA inhibitors to evaluate ADA activity. The assay can simultaneously determine substrate and product, with the endogenous substance and ADA inhibitors added not interfering in its activity. After optimizing the enzymatic incubation and UHPLC-MS/MS conditions, Km and Vmax values for ADA deamination of cordycepin were 95.18 ± 7.85 μm and 363.90 ± 12.16 μmol/min/unit, respectively. Oleanolic acid and ursolic acid from Ligustri Lucidi Fructus were chosen as ADA inhibitors with half maximal inhibitory concentration values of 21.82 ± 0.39 and 18.41 ± 0.14 μm, respectively. A non-competitive inhibition model was constructed and this assay can be used to screen other potential ADA inhibitors quickly and accurately.

Chinese medicine CGA formula ameliorates liver fibrosis induced by carbon tetrachloride involving inhibition of hepatic apoptosis in rats

ETHNOPHARMACOLOGICAL REVELVANCE

CGA consisting of Cordyceps sinensis mycelia polysaccharide, gypenosides and amygdalin, was demonstrated to be the effective components formula in Fuzheng Huayu (FZHY) capsule, a traditional Chinese medicine approved by China food and drug administration for treatment of liver fibrosis and to inhibit transforming growth factor-β1 (TGF-β1) signaling, previously.

AIM OF THE STUDY

To evaluate the effects of CGA on hepatic apoptosis in liver fibrosis induced by carbon tetrachloride (CCl₄).

MATERIALS AND METHODS

The hepatic injury and histology was detected by serum biomarker assay and hematoxylin-eosin staining. The hepatic collagen was illustrated by Sirius red staining and hydroxyproline (Hyp) concentration. The hepatic stellate cells (HSCs) activation and hepatic apoptosis was visualized by immunohistochemical analysis of α-smooth muscle actin (α-SMA) and terminal deoxynucleotidyl transferase-mediated dUPT nick-end labeling (TUNEL) assay respectively. The protein expression of collagen type I (Col-I), α-SMA, TGF-β1, Fas, tumor necrosis factor receptor 1 (TNF-R1), cleaved-caspase-8, cleaved-caspase-10, cleaved-caspase-9, cleaved-caspase-3, mitochondrial Bcl-2, Bcl-2 associated X protein (Bax), Bcl-2 homologous antagonist/killer (Bak), cytochrome C and cytoplasmic cytochrome C was detected by western-blot.

RESULTS

CGA or FZHY ameliorated liver histological changes, decreasing serum alanine aminotransferase, aspartate aminotransferase, hepatic Hyp, TUNEL positive-stained area, and down-regulated the protein expression of α-SMA, TGF-β1, Col-I, Fas, TNF-R1, cleaved-caspase-8, cleaved-caspase-10, cleaved-caspase-9, and cleaved-caspase-3, mitochondrial Bax, Bak, and cytoplasmic cytochrome C, while restored the expression of mitochondrial Bcl-2 and cytochrome C.

CONCLUSION

CGA formula ameliorates liver fibrosis induced by CCl₄, which is correlated to its inhibition on hepatic apoptosis.

A Network Pharmacology Approach to Uncover the Molecular Mechanisms of Herbal Formula Ban-Xia-Xie-Xin-Tang

Ban-Xia-Xie-Xin-Tang (BXXXT) is a classical formula from Shang-Han-Lun which is one of the earliest books of TCM clinical practice. In this work, we investigated the therapeutic mechanisms of BXXXT for the treatment of multiple diseases using a network pharmacology approach. Here three BXXXT representative diseases (colitis, diabetes mellitus, and gastric cancer) were discussed, and we focus on in silico methods that integrate drug-likeness screening, target prioritizing, and multilayer network extending. A total of 140 core targets and 72 representative compounds were finally identified to elucidate the pharmacology of BXXXT formula. After constructing multilayer networks, a good overlap between BXXXT nodes and disease nodes was observed at each level, and the network-based proximity analysis shows that the relevance between the formula targets and disease genes was significant according to the shortest path distance (SPD) and a random walk with restart (RWR) based scores for each disease. We found that there were 22 key pathways significantly associated with BXXXT, and the therapeutic effects of BXXXT were likely addressed by regulating a combination of targets in a modular pattern. Furthermore, the synergistic effects among BXXXT herbs were highlighted by elucidating the molecular mechanisms of individual herbs, and the traditional theory of "Jun-Chen-Zuo-Shi" of TCM formula was effectively interpreted from a network perspective. The proposed approach provides an effective strategy to uncover the mechanisms of action and combinatorial rules of BXXXT formula in a holistic manner.

A Label-Free Fluorescent Assay for the Rapid and Sensitive Detection of Adenosine Deaminase Activity and Inhibition

Adenosine deaminase (ADA), able to catalyze the irreversible deamination of adenosine into inosine, can be found in almost all tissues and plays an important role in several diseases. In this work, we developed a label-free fluorescence method for the detection of adenosine deaminase activity and inhibition. In the presence of ADA, ATP has been shown to be hydrolyzed. The ATP aptamer was shown to form a G-quadruplex/thioflavin T (ThT) complex with ThT and exhibited an obvious fluorescence signal. However, the ATP aptamer could bind with ATP and exhibited a low fluorescence signal because of the absence of ADA. This assay showed high sensitivity to ADA with a detection limit of 1 U/L based on an SNR of 3 and got a good linear relationship within the range of 1–100 U/L with R² = 0.9909. The LOD is lower than ADA cutoff value (4 U/L) in the clinical requirement and more sensitive than most of the reported methods. This technique exhibited high selectivity for ADA against hoGG I, UDG, RNase H and λexo. Moreover, this strategy was successfully applied for assaying the inhibition of ADA using erythro-9-(2-hydroxy-3-nonyl) adenine (EHNA) and, as such, demonstrated great potential for the future use in the diagnosis of ADA-relevant diseases, particularly in advanced drug development.