Hericium VN, an undescribed compound isolated from Hericium erinaceus and its cytotoxic activity on human brain astrocytoma.

Hericium erinaceus is a species of mushroom with high nutritional value that is used mainly as food in tropical countries. Phytochemical study of H. erinaceus led to the isolation of an undescribed compound, named as hericium VN (1), together with nine known compounds, 1-(2-formyl-1-pyrrolyl)butanoic acid (2), herierin III (3), 5'-(methylthio)adenosine (4), adenosine (5), nicotinic acid (6), (22E,24R)-5α,8α-epidioxyergosta-6,9(11),22-trien-3ß-ol (7), 5α,8α-peroxycerevisterol (8), (22E,24R)-5α,8α-epidioxy-egosta-6,22-diene 3-O-ß-D-glucopyranoside (9), and cerevisterol (10) based on extensive analyses of HR-ESI-MS, 1D and 2D NMR spectra. The absolute configuration of compound 1 was determined by experimental combined with calculated electronic circular dichroism spectra. Compound 7 exhibited cytotoxic effects against brain tumor cell line CCF-STTG1 with the IC50 value of 15.50 µM, compared to that of the positive control compound, doxorubicin, which showed IC50 value of 15.84 µM.

Design, synthesis, structure, in vitro cytotoxic activity evaluation and docking studies on target enzyme GSK-3ß of new indirubin-3'-oxime derivatives.

The addition of chalcone and amine components into indirubin-3'-oxime resulted in 15 new derivatives with high yields. Structures of new derivatives were also elucidated through 1D, 2D-NMR and HR-MS(ESI) spectra and X-ray crystallography. All designed compounds were screened for cytotoxic activity against four human cancer cell lines (HepG2, LU-1, SW480 and HL-60) and one human normal kidney cell line (HEK-293). Compound 6f exhibited the most marked cytotoxicity meanwhile cytotoxicity of compounds 6e, 6h and 6l was more profound toward cancer cell lines than toward normal cell. These new derivatives were further analyzed via molecular docking studies on GSK-3ß enzyme. Docking analysis shows that most of the derivatives exhibited potential inhibition activity against GSK-3ß with characteristic interacting residues in the binding site. The fast pulling of ligand scheme was then employed to refine the binding affinity and mechanism between ligands and GSK-3ß enzyme. The computational results are expected to contribute to predicting enzyme target of the trial inhibitors and their possible interaction, from which the design of new cytotoxic agents could be created in the future.