ABSTRACT
Objective:To explore the mechanism of the extraction of Carthami flos in the treatment of chronic alcoholic liver injury based on metabolomics. Methods:The rats were randomly divided into normal group, model group, positive control group and low, medium and high dose groups of the extraction of Carthami flos, with 10 rats in each group. In addition to the normal group, the other groups were gavaged with 8 ml/kg of 56° Niulanshan Baijiu to prepare the rat model with chronic alcoholic liver injury. After the successful modeling, the positive control group was gavaged with 0.36 mg/kg of Hugan tablet, and the low, medium and high dose groups were gavaged with 0.476 7, 1.430 1 and 4.290 3 g/kg of the extraction of Carthami flos respectively, once a day for 21 days. The contents of GPT, GOT, TG and ALP2 in serum were detected by automatic biochemical analyzer, and the effects of the extraction of Carthami flos on chronic alcoholic liver injury in rats were analyzed by Ultra High Performance Liquid Chromatography-Mass Spectrometry (UPLC-MS), cluster analysis, Principal Component Analysis (PCA) and Orthogonal Partial Least Squares Discriminant Analysis (OPLS-DA). Results:The levels of GPT [(42.11±6.58)U/L, (42.38±6.58)U/L vs. (49.96±10.70)U/L] and GOT [(104.81±14.70)U/L, (102.91±23.65)U/L vs. (159.66±53.69)U/L] decreased ( P<0.05 or P<0.01), while the levels of TG [(0.85±0.29)U/L, (0.85±0.23)U/L vs.(0.62±0.21)U/L] and ALP2 [(104.53±13.53)U/L, (100.30±17.28)U/L vs.(77.13±12.54)U/L] increased ( P<0.05 or P<0.01); The results of cluster analysis, PCA and OPLS-DA showed that the model group and the high-dose group of the extraction of Carthami flos could be distinguished obviously. A total of 20 chemical markers were obtained in the serum of rats with chronic alcoholic liver injury treated with the extraction of Carthami flos. Among them, the extraction of Carthami flos can down regulate the level of serum linolenic acid triglyceride in rats with chronic alcoholic liver injury and up regulate triglyceride, palmitic acid, lysophosphatidylcholine, palmitoyl ethanolamide, epinephrine, sphingosine, lysophosphingomyelin α-Linolenic acid, docosahexaenoic acid and eicosapentaenoic acid are 10 endogenous metabolites. Conclusion:The treatment of chronic alcoholic liver injury with the extraction of Carthami flos may be related to the regulation of endogenous metabolites docosahexadilute acid, docosapentadilute acid α- Linolenic acid.