ABSTRACT
The quality of traditional Chinese medicine has a direct impact on the effectiveness and safety of its use, and is the premise necessary to ensure the healthy development of the traditional Chinese medicine industry. Comprehensive and accurate control and evaluation of the quality of medicinal materials is of great significance to the traditional Chinese medicine industry, but the complexity and dynamics of the chemical composition of medicinal materials makes their quality evaluation a challenge. Plant metabolomics provides an integrated and comprehensive analysis that is consistent with the holistic approach of traditional Chinese medicine. Chemical information therein promotes the establishment of a traceable system and provides new ideas and methods for the quality evaluation of medicinal materials. Plant metabolomics in the quality evaluation of medicinal materials is gradually increasing, and the core is the screening and identification of differential metabolites or specific marker compounds by means of stoichiometry. This study focused on the main factors that affect the quality of medicinal materials, such as origin, environmental adversity, varieties, harvest time, commercial specification and TCM processing. We describe the research progress in plant metabolomics combined with chemometrics analysis for the quality control and evaluation of medicinal materials, summarize existing problems, identify trends, and propose future research directions. Metabolomics plays an increasingly important role in the quality evaluation of medicinal materials, but the absolute qualitative and quantitative information of metabolomics needs to be further developed, and a single 'omics' technique is not sufficient for an in-depth analysis of medicinal value. In the future, standardization of plant metabolomics methods and a more complete database should be actively promoted, and plant metabolomics should be integrated into quality marker exploration. Plant metabolomics will need to be integrated with other 'omics' methods to improve the quality and evaluation system of medicinal materials.
ABSTRACT
Breast cancer is globally the most common invasive cancer in women and remains one of the leading causes of cancer-related deaths. Surgery, radiotherapy, chemotherapy, immunotherapy, and endocrine therapy are currently the main treatments for this cancer type. However, some breast cancer patients are prone to drug resistance related to chemotherapy or immunotherapy, resulting in limited treatment efficacy. Consequently, traditional Chinese medicinal materials (TCMMs) as natural products have become an attractive source of novel drugs. In this review, we summarized the current knowledge on the active components of animal-derived TCMMs, including Ophiocordycepssinensis-derived cordycepin, the aqueous and ethanolic extracts of O.sinensis, norcantharidin (NCTD), Chansu, bee venom, deer antlers, Ostreagigas, and scorpion venom, with reference to marked anti-breast cancer effects due to regulating cell cycle arrest, proliferation, apoptosis, metastasis, and drug resistance. In future studies, the underlying mechanisms for the antitumor effects of these components need to be further investigated by utilizing multi-omics technologies. Furthermore, large-scale clinical trials are necessary to validate the efficacy of bioactive constituents alone or in combination with chemotherapeutic drugs for breast cancer treatment.
Subject(s)
Animals , Female , Humans , Breast Neoplasms/drug therapy , Cell Cycle Checkpoints , China , Deer , ImmunotherapyABSTRACT
Traditional Chinese medicinal materials (TCMMs) are the material basis of the traditional Chinese medicines (TCM) in the treatment of disease, and the inherent quality of the TCMMs are of crucial importance for the efficacy and safety of TCM. Most of the TCMMs are originated from the plants with complex chemical compositions, and the chemical diversity is inevitable. How to clarify the relationship between the chemical identity and the biological activity is the key point for quality control of TCMMs in the establishment of the quality standards. The components with great impact on the biological activities should be used as index compounds in the quality evaluation. In this study, based on the results in our previous studies, a research idea on the evaluation of quality difference of TCMMs is proposed. Its application and existing problems are also discussed.
ABSTRACT
Maca (Lepidium meyenii Walp.) has been used as both food and traditional medicine for centuries for its high nutritional value and multi-medicinal properties. Macamides, the marker compounds of maca, are a series of nonpolar, long chain fatty acid N-benzylamides. Most of them have neuroprotective and neuroregulation effects. In this paper, we reviewed the structures of macamides, methods of chemical synthesis, and quantitative determination, and their bioactivities to provide a reference for further research and development.
ABSTRACT
OBJECTIVE: To evaluate the feasibility of relay intercropping Ophiopogonis Radix and vegetables by measuring the yield and contents of effective components and fingerprint analysis. METHODS: The field capacity when relay intercropping Ophiopogonis Radix and vegetables was evaluated, taking Ophiopogonis Radix monoculture as control. The contents of major compound of Ophiopogonis Radix were measured by ultraviolet spectrophotometry and high performance liquid chromatography, and the HPLC fingerprint of Ophiopogonis Radix was established. RESULTS: Relay intercropping vegetables reduced the yield of Ophiopogonis Radix to some extent, but the land equivalent ratios were all more than 1, indicating that it is advantageous to intercrop Ophiopogonis Radix and vegetables. Relay intercropping vegetables did not reduce the contents of chemical constituents in Ophiopogonis Radix significantly. The similarities of all the HPLC fingerprint chromatograms were greater than 0.990. CONCLUSION: Relay intercropping Ophiopogonis Radix and vegetables is a feasible pattern to solve the contention for land between Ophiopogonis Radix and vegetables in the main producing areas of Ophiopogonis Radix, and can be applied and generalized.