Two neolignans from Penthorum Chinense and their antiproliferative activities

An Updated Review on Efficiency of Penthorum chinense Pursh in Traditional Uses, Toxicology, and Clinical Trials

Traditional Chinese medicines (TCM) play an important role in the control and treatment of several animal diseases. Penthorum chinense Pursh (PCP) is a famous plant for its use in traditional medication practice and therapeutic effects in numerous pathological conditions. In China, PCP is utilized for both food and medication due to numerous bioactivities. PCP is widely administered in prevention and treatment of traumatic injury, edema, and liver diseases with functions of reducing swelling, support diuresis, blood stasis, and mitigation symptoms of excessive alcohol intake. Recently, PCP highlighted for research trials in various fields including pharmacology, pharmacognosy, cosmeceuticals, nutraceuticals, and pharmaceuticals due to medicinal significance with less toxicity and an effective ethnomedicine in veterinary practice. PCP contains diverse important ingredients such as flavonoids, organic acids, coumarins, lignans, polyphenols, and sterols that are important bioactive constituents of PCP exerting the therapeutic benefits and organ-protecting effects. In veterinary, PCP extract, compound, and phytochemicals/biomolecules significantly reversed the liver and kidney injuries, via antioxidation, oxidative stress, apoptosis, mitochondrial signaling pathways, and related genes. PCP water extract and compounds also proved in animal and humans' clinical trial for their hepatoprotective, antiaging, nephroprotective, anti-inflammatory, antidiabetic, antibacterial, antiapoptotic, immune regulation, and antioxidative stress pathways. This updated review spotlighted the current information on efficiency and application of PCP by compiling and reviewing recent publications on animal research. In addition, this review discussed the toxicology, traditional use, comparative, and clinical application of PCP in veterinary practices to authenticate and find out new perspectives on the research and development of this herbal medicine.

Network Pharmacology-Based Analysis on the Curative Effect of Kunxian Capsules against Rheumatoid Arthritis

Kunxian capsules (KCs), a Chinese patent medicine, have been clinically proven to be effective in the treatment of rheumatoid arthritis (RA). However, the chemical profile of KC remains to be characterized, and the mechanism underlying the protective effect against RA is yet to be elucidated. Here, a network pharmacology-based approach was adopted, integrated with the chemical profiling of KC by UHPLC-Q-TOF/MS. As a result, a total of 67 compounds have been identified from KC extract, among which 43 were authenticated by comparison to the mass spectrum of standard chemicals. ADME behaviors of the chemical constituents of KC were predicted, resulting in 35 putative active ingredients. Through target prediction of both active ingredients of KC and RA and PPI analysis, core targets were screened out, followed by biological process and related pathway enrichment. Then, a TCM-herb-ingredient-target-pathway network was constructed and a multicomponent, multitarget, and multipathway synergistic mechanism was proposed, providing an information basis for further investigation. The active pharmaceutical ingredients included mainly terpenoids (such as triptolide and celastrol), sesquiterpene pyridines (such as wilforgine and wilforine), and flavonoids (such as icariin, epimedin A, B, and C, and 2″-O-rhamnosylicariside II).

Identification of neolignans with PCSK9 downregulatory and LDLR upregulatory activities from Penthorum chinense and the potential in cholesterol uptake by transcriptional regulation of LDLR via SREBP2

ETHNOPHARMACOLOGICAL RELEVANCE

Penthorum chinense has been used in East Asia for the treatment of cholecystitis, infectious hepatitis, jaundice and to treat liver problems. Recent evidences provided the potential for the clinical use of P. chinense in the treatment of metabolic disease.

AIM OF THE STUDY

Based on the traditional use and recent evidences, we investigated the effects of constituents from P. chinense with modulation on proprotein convertase subtilisin/kexin type 9 (PCSK9) and low-density lipoprotein receptor (LDLR) expression, and the effect of the most active substance on cholesterol uptake, and genes relevant to lipid metabolism.

MATERIALS AND METHODS

The isolation of compounds from the BuOH-soluble extract of 80% methanol extract of P. chinense was conducted using chromatographic methods and the structures were established by interpreting spectroscopic data. Quantitative real time-PCR, and Western blot analysis were performed to monitor the regulatory activity on PCSK9 and LDLR expression. PCSK9-LDLR binding interaction was also tested. The cholesterol uptake in hepatocyte was measured using 1,1-dioctadecyl-3,3,3,3-tetramethylindocarbocyanine perchlorate (DiI)-labeled LDL cholesterol. Additionally, gene network analysis of LDLR and responses of its target proteins were carried out to discover genes germane to the effect of active compound on HepG2 cells. Moreover, we performed protein-protein interaction analysis via String and constructed the compound target network using Cytoscape.

RESULTS

Two new neolignans and 37 known compounds were characterized from P. chinense. Of the isolated compounds, (7'E,8S)-2',4,8-trihydroxy-3-methoxy-2,4'-epoxy-8,5'-neolign-7'-en-7-one (3), penthorin A (4) and methyl gallate (25) were found to suppress PCSK9 mRNA expression with IC₅₀ values of 5.13, 15.56 and 11.66 μM, respectively. However, all the isolated compounds were found to be inactive in PCSK9-LDLR interaction assay. Additionally, a dibenzoxepine-type lignan analog, (7'E,8S)-2',4,8-trihydroxy-3-methoxy-2,4'-epoxy-8,5'-neolign-7'-en-7-one (3) demonstrated to upregulate LDLR mRNA and protein expression via transcriptional factor sterol regulatory element-binding protein 2 (SREBP2). Furthermore, (7'E,8S)-2',4,8-trihydroxy-3-methoxy-2,4'-epoxy-8,5'-neolign-7'-en-7-one (3) increase the LDL-cholesterol uptake in DiI-LDL assay.

CONCLUSION

(7'E,8S)-2',4,8-trihydroxy-3-methoxy-2,4'-epoxy-8,5'-neolign-7'-en-7-one (3) seemed to increase potentially cholesterol uptake via the downregulation of PCSK9 and the activation of LDLR in hepatocytes. Moreover, SREBP2 was found to play an important role in regulation of PCSK9 and LDLR by (7'E,8S)-2',4,8-trihydroxy-3-methoxy-2,4'-epoxy-8,5'-neolign-7'-en-7-one.

Bioactivity Evaluation of Pinocembrin Derivatives From Penthorum chinense Pursh Stems

The extract of Penthorum chinense Pursh (PCP), a well-known Miao herb medicine, has been used as a key component for a Chinese patented drug to treat several kinds of liver-related diseases. In this work, 3 pinocembrin derivatives, S1, S2, and S3, were isolated from PCP stems and identified with high-performance liquid chromatography and electrospray ionization mass spectrometer. The molecular masses of S1, S2, and S3 were identical to Pinocembrin-7-O-[4″,6″-hexahydroxydiphenoyl (HHDP)]-β-D-glucose, Pinocembrin-7-O-[3″-O-galloyl-4″,6″-(s)-HHDP)-β-D-glucose, and Thonningianin A, respectively. Their free radical scavenging capability was evaluated with the 2,2-diphenyl-1-picrylhydrazyl assay. The half-maximal effective concentrations of S1, S2, and S3 were 26.75, 9.06, and 5.50 μg/mL, respectively. In vitro AML-12 assays demonstrated that S1 (5-20 μg/mL), S2 (10-40 μg/mL), and S3 (10-40 μg/mL) not only protected cells from H2O2-induced oxidation and alcohol-induced cell damages, but also reduced oleic acid (OA)-induced triglyceride accumulations in a dose-dependent manner. However, the 3 compounds potently exhibited similar cytotoxicity effect at high concentrations. The half-maximal inhibitory concentrations of S1, S2, and S3 to AML-12 cells were 74.19, 85.86, and 80.43 μg/mL. In addition, the 3 compounds also showed antibacterial activity on Escherichia coli, Staphylococcus aureus, Enterococcus faecalis, Lactobacillus rhamnosus, and Bacillus subtilis.

Three new flavonoids from Penthorum chinense Pursh and their docking studies

Three new flavonoids, pinocembrin-7-O-[3″-O-galloyl]-β-D-glucose (1), pinocembrin-7-O-[2″-O-galloyl-4″,6″-hexahydroxydiphenoyl]-β-D-glucose (2), 2',6'-dihydroxydihydrochalcone-4'-O-[2″-O-galloyl-4″,6″-hexahydroxydiphenoyl]-β-D-glucopyranoside (3), and 12 known compounds (4-15) were isolated from Penthorum Chinense Pursh. The structures of all compounds were established mainly by NMR and MS experiments as well as the necessary chemical evidence. The anti-hyperlipidemic activities of the three new flavonoids were predicted by molecular docking.