The Hepatotoxicity of Alantolactone and Germacrone: Their Influence on Cholesterol and Lipid Metabolism in Differentiated HepaRG Cells

The potential efficacy of sesquiterpenes and their derivatives in treating rheumatoid arthritis: A systematic review

Rheumatoid arthritis (RA) is an autoimmune disorder primarily targeting peripheral joints. The global prevalence of RA is increasing, posing a significant challenge in patient care management. Despite therapeutic advancements, their inherent limitations highlight the need for further research on safer treatment interventions. Among potential candidates, sesquiterpenes, a subclass of plant secondary metabolites composed of three isoprene units, have exhibited remarkable efficacy in treating various inflammatory disorders, including RA. In this systematic review, we summarized the treatment evidence of sesquiterpenes and their derivatives on RA. Specific major sesquiterpenoids have been discussed in detail, as well as the possible mechanisms by which cells and chemical messengers are involved in treating RA. Our review indicated that sesquiterpenes are potential novel, bioactive compounds for RA prevention and treatment strategies.

Metabolism and distribution of two major constituents of 'Xing-Nao-Jing Injection'-germacrone and curdione in rats

Germacrone and curdione are germacrane-type sesquiterpenoids that are widely distributed and have extensive pharmacological activities; they are the main constituents of 'Xing-Nao-Jing Injection' (XNJ). Studies on the metabolic features of germacrane-type sesquiterpenoids are limited. In this study, the metabolites of germacrone and curdione were characterized by UHPLC-Q-Exactive Oribitrap mass spectrometry after they were orally administered to rats. In total, 60 and 76 metabolites were found and preliminarily identified in rats administered germacrone and curdione, respectively, among which at least 123 potential new compounds were included. New metabolic reactions of germacrane-type sesquiterpenoids were identified, which included oxidation (+4 O and +5 O), ethylation, methyl-sulfinylation, vitamin C conjugation, and cysteine conjugation reactions. Among the 136 metabolites (including 113 oxidation metabolites, two glucuronidation, two methylation, nine methyl-sulfinylation, three ethylation, six cysteine conjugation, and one Vitamin C conjugation metabolites), 32 metabolites were detected in nine organs, and the stomach, intestine, liver, kidneys, and small intestine were the main organs for the distribution of these metabolites. All 136 metabolites were detected in urine and 64 of them were found in feces. The results of this study not only contribute to research on in vivo processes related to germacrane-type sesquiterpenoids but also provide a strong foundation for a better understanding of in vivo processes and the effective forms of germacrone, curdione, and XNJ.

Potential roles and molecular mechanisms of bioactive ingredients in Curcumae Rhizoma against breast cancer

BACKGROUND

Breast cancer is the most prevalent cancer worldwide, with high morbidity and mortality. Despite great advances in the therapeutic strategies, the survival rate in the past decades of patients with breast cancer remains unsatisfactory. Growing evidence has demonstrated that Curcumae Rhizoma, called Ezhu in Chinese, showed various pharmacological properties, including anti-bacterial, anti-oxidant, anti-inflammatory and anti-tumor activities. It has been widely used in Chinese medicine to treat many types of human cancer.

PURPOSE

To comprehensively summarize and analyze the effects of active substances in Curcumae Rhizoma on breast cancer malignant phenotypes and the underlying mechanisms, as well as discuss its medicinal value and future perspectives.

METHOD

We used "Curcumae Rhizoma" or the name of crude extracts and bioactive components in Curcumae Rhizoma in combination with "breast cancer" as key words. Studies focusing on their anti-breast cancer activities and mechanisms of action were extracted from Pubmed, Web of Science and CNKI databases up to October 2022. The Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA) 2020 guideline was followed.

RESULTS

Crude extracts and 7 main bioactive phytochemicals (curcumol, β-elemene, furanodiene, furanodienone, germacrone, curdione and curcumin) isolated from Curcumae Rhizoma have shown many anti-breast cancer pharmacological properties, including inhibiting cell proliferation, migration, invasion and stemness, reversing chemoresistance, and inducing cell apoptosis, cycle arrest and ferroptosis. The mechanisms of action were involved in regulating MAPK, PI3K/AKT and NF-κB signaling pathways. In vivo and clinical studies demonstrated that these compounds exhibited high anti-tumor efficacy and safety against breast cancer.

CONCLUSION

These findings provide strong evidence that Curcumae Rhizoma acts as a rich source of phytochemicals and has robust anti-breast cancer properties.

The toxicity of nano polyethylene terephthalate to mice: Intestinal obstruction, growth retardant, gut microbiota dysbiosis and lipid metabolism disorders

Polyethylene terephthalate (PET) are widely used in our daily life while they may be broken to smaller fractions as nano-sized PET (nPET) in the environment. The toxicity of nPET is still less studied. This work first evaluated the LD50 of different size of nPET (200 nm, S-nPET; 700 nm, B-nPET) in mice, then studied the health effects of single exposure to S/B-nPET at 200 mg/kg bw for 30 days. It was found that the LD50 was 266 mg/kg bw for S-nPET and 523 mg/kg bw for B-nPET, respectively, showing a size-dependent effect. S-nPET caused weight loss, cyst, intestinal obstruction, organ damage and mortality (40%), and perturbed gut microbiome and metabolome especially lipid metabolism, such as upregulated cholesterol, glycocholic, propionic acid, niacinamide, ectoine and xanthine, and downregulated arachidonic acid, anserine, histamine, while B-nPET did not. Serological analysis found S-nPET brought more lipid metabolic immune and neurological damage than B-nPET, confirming the size-dependent effect. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first report on the systematic toxicity of nPET to mice. Further studies are warranted for life-long effects of nPET. The protocol applied in this work may also be used for the study of the health effects of other plastics.

Curcumae rhizoma and its major constituents against hepatobiliary disease: Pharmacotherapeutic properties and potential clinical applications

BACKGROUND

Hepatobiliary disease currently serves as an urgent health issue in public due to health-modulating factors such as extension of life expectancy, increasingly sedentary lifestyles and over-nutrition. A definite treatment remains lacking owing to different stages of the disease itself and its intricate pathogenesis. Traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) has been gradually popularized in clinic with the satisfactory efficacy and good safety. Curcumae Rhizoma (called E Zhu, EZ in Chinese) is a representative herb, which has been used to treat hepatobiliary disease for thousands of years.

PURPOSE

To systematically summarize the recent research advances on the pharmacological activities of EZ and its constituents, explain the underlying mechanisms of preventing and treating hepatobiliary diseases, and assess the shortcomings of existing work. Besides, ethnopharmacology, phytochemicals, and toxicology of EZ have been researched.

METHODS

The information about EZ was collected from various sources including classic books about Chinese herbal medicine, and scientific databases including Web of Science, PubMed, ScienceDirect, Springer, ACS, SCOPUS, CNKI, CSTJ, and WANFANG using keywords given below and terms like pharmacological and phytochemical details of this plant.

RESULTS

The chemical constituents isolated and identified from EZ, such as terpenoids including β-elemene, furanodiene, germacrone, etc. and curcuminoids including curcumin, demethoxycurcumin, bisdemethoxycurcumin, etc. prove to have hepatoprotective effect, anti-liver fibrotic effect, anti-fatty liver effect, anti-liver neoplastic effect, and cholagogic effect through TGF-β1/Smad, JNK1/2-ROS, NF-κB and other anti-inflammatory and antioxidant signaling pathways. Also, EZ is often combined with other Chinese herbs in the treatment of hepatobiliary diseases with good clinical efficacy and no obvious adverse reactions.

CONCLUSION

It provides a preclinical basis for the efficacy of EZ as an effective therapeutic agent for the prevention and treatment of hepatobiliary diseases. Even so, the further studies still needed to alleviate hepatotoxicity and expand clinical application.

FL-DTD: an integrated pipeline to predict the drug interacting targets by feedback loop-based network analysis

Drug target discovery is an essential step to reveal the mechanism of action (MoA) underlying drug therapeutic effects and/or side effects. Most of the approaches are usually labor-intensive while unable to identify the tissue-specific interacting targets, especially the targets with weaker drug binding affinity. In this work, we proposed an integrated pipeline, FL-DTD, to predict the drug interacting targets of novel compounds in a tissue-specific manner. This method was built based on a hypothesis that cells under a status of homeostasis would take responses to drug perturbation by activating feedback loops. Therefore, the drug interacting targets can be predicted by analyzing the network responses after drug perturbation. We evaluated this method using the expression data of estrogen stimulation, gene manipulation and drug perturbation and validated its good performance to identify the annotated drug targets. Using STAT3 as a target protein, we applied this method to drug perturbation data of 500 natural compounds and predicted five compounds with STAT3 interacting activities. Experimental assay validated the STAT3-interacting activities of four compounds. Overall, our evaluation suggests that FL-DTD predicts the drug interacting targets with good accuracy and can be used for drug target discovery.

Alantolactone: A sesquiterpene lactone with diverse pharmacological effects

Alantolactone (Ala) is a sesquiterpene lactone that can be isolated from many herbal plants belonging to Asteraceae. Besides the antimicrobial activities against bacteria, fungi and viruses, Ala has also demonstrated significant anti-inflammatory effects in various models by inhibiting NF-κB and MAPKs to decrease the pro-inflammatory cytokines such as IL-1β, IL-6 and TNF-α. The antitumor effects of Ala have been demonstrated in vitro and in vivo via inducing intrinsic apoptosis, oxidative stress, ER stress, cell cycle arrest and inhibiting autophagy and STAT3 phosphorylation, which are also involved in its combination or synergy with other antitumor drugs. Ala also has neuroprotective activity through attenuating oxidative stress and inflammation, besides its modulation of glucose and lipid metabolism. This review summarizes the recent advances of the pharmacological effects of Ala, including anti-inflammatory, antitumor, antimicrobial, neuroprotective activities, as well as the underlying mechanisms. Ala might be employed as a potential lead to develop drugs for multiple diseases.

Curcuma zedoaria Rosc (Zingiberaceae): a review on its chemical, pharmacological and biological activities

Background

Around 80% of human population in the world relies on herbal or phytomedicines for their primary health care needs. The treatment of many diseases and disorders with phytomedicines is considered and observed as very safe with no or minimal side effects. Many medicinal plants and their preparations are practised at home as remedies for treating and preventing various diseases and disorders. For example, medicinal plants and their crude parts such as tulsi, neem, turmeric and ginger are used to cure or treat several common ailments, out of which Curcuma zedoaria Rosc commonly known as white turmeric is one of the important crude drugs belonging to Zingiberaceae family and genus Curcuma. Traditionally, it has been reported to possess many biological activities been used for many therapeutic actions due to the presence of wide range of phytoconstituents in it. The main objectives of the present work are to carry out extensive review on its chemical, pharmacological and biological activities of plant.

Main body

In the present review article, extensive data on its chemical, pharmacological and biological activities have been collected from various online sources including indexing sites such as Web of Science, Scopus, PubMed and Research Gate and presented. Various articles published in indexed journals and other databases have been collected and reviewed systematically.

Conclusion

The present review investigation is very much helpful for researchers and readers to collectively have valuable information on chemistry, pharmacology and biological effects of Curcuma zedoaria Rosc. The present investigation concludes that the white turmeric is found to possess complex range of phytoconstituents such as curcumin, ethyl p-methoxycinnamate, β-turmerone, β-eudesmol, zingiberene, dihydrocurcumin, furanodiene, α-phellandrene, 1–8 cineole, β-elemense and germacrone. Due to the presence of wide range of phytoconstituents, plants have been reported for its diverse biological activities.