1.Modern Research Progress of Polyphyllin Ⅰ: A Review
Kaixin WANG ; Mengru CAI ; Dongge YIN ; Xueling HU ; Tingting FU ; Rongyue ZHU ; Shilang LIAO ; Jian NI ; Xingbin YIN
Chinese Journal of Experimental Traditional Medical Formulae 2023;29(22):254-264
Paridis Rhizoma, a traditional valuable Chinese herbal medicine, has the functions of clearing heat and removing toxin, relieving edema and pain, cooling liver and calming convulsion, which can be used to treat various diseases such as mumps, abscess, burn, bleeding, and tumor. It has been used in folk medicine for a long time and is the main raw material of various Chinese patent medicines such as Gongxuening Capsules and Yunnan Baiyao. Polyphyllin Ⅰ, an isospirostanol saponin and one of the main active components in Paridis Rhizoma, is distributed in the rhizome, pericarp, and leaves of Paris polyphylla. With high polarity, polyphyllin Ⅰ is mainly extracted by n-butanol extraction and macroporous adsorption resin chromatography, separated by silica gel column chromatography and preparative high performance liquid chromatography, and purified with the combination of methods. With anti-tumor, anti-inflammatory, antibacterial, and anti-virus effects, it is generally employed to treat liver cancer, lung cancer, gastric cancer and other cancers as well as arthritis, influenza, sore toxin, and bacterial infection. However, polyphyllin Ⅰ may cause stomach irritation, hemolysis, liver damage, kidney damage, heart damage, and other adverse reactions. Pharmacokinetic studies show that it has problems such as low bioavailability and poor intestinal absorption and permeability, which affect the clinical application of polyphyllin Ⅰ. This paper summarizes the research on the plant sources, extraction and separation methods, pharmacological effects, adverse reactions, and pharmacokinetics of polyphyllin Ⅰ in recent years, which is expected to provide a reference for the rational clinical application and other in-depth research work of polyphyllin Ⅰ.
2.Functional annotation map of natural compounds in traditional Chinese medicines library: TCMs with myocardial protection as a case.
Xudong XING ; Mengru SUN ; Zifan GUO ; Yongjuan ZHAO ; Yuru CAI ; Ping ZHOU ; Huiying WANG ; Wen GAO ; Ping LI ; Hua YANG
Acta Pharmaceutica Sinica B 2023;13(9):3802-3816
The chemical complexity of traditional Chinese medicines (TCMs) makes the active and functional annotation of natural compounds challenging. Herein, we developed the TCMs-Compounds Functional Annotation platform (TCMs-CFA) for large-scale predicting active compounds with potential mechanisms from TCM complex system, without isolating and activity testing every single compound one by one. The platform was established based on the integration of TCMs knowledge base, chemome profiling, and high-content imaging. It mainly included: (1) selection of herbal drugs of target based on TCMs knowledge base; (2) chemome profiling of TCMs extract library by LC‒MS; (3) cytological profiling of TCMs extract library by high-content cell-based imaging; (4) active compounds discovery by combining each mass signal and multi-parametric cell phenotypes; (5) construction of functional annotation map for predicting the potential mechanisms of lead compounds. In this stud TCMs with myocardial protection were applied as a case study, and validated for the feasibility and utility of the platform. Seven frequently used herbal drugs (Ginseng, etc.) were screened from 100,000 TCMs formulas for myocardial protection and subsequently prepared as a library of 700 extracts. By using TCMs-CFA platform, 81 lead compounds, including 10 novel bioactive ones, were quickly identified by correlating 8089 mass signals with 170,100 cytological parameters from an extract library. The TCMs-CFA platform described a new evidence-led tool for the rapid discovery process by data mining strategies, which is valuable for novel lead compounds from TCMs. All computations are done through Python and are publicly available on GitHub.