[Research progress on intestinal microecology regulating mechanism and biological activities of polysaccharides].

Intestinal microecology is an important defense system in the human body. The intestinal flora is the core micro-ecosystem in the human intestine. It has a symbiotic relationship with the overall functions of the body. It has strong metabolic activity to maintain the normal functioning of the body and resist the invasion of various viral antigens in the body. Playing a protective function,the imbalanced intestinal microecology can cause various diseases. Polysaccharides can be extracted from a wide range of sources and have low toxicity and side effects. They have attracted wide attention because of their anti-tumor, anti-oxidant, anti-inflammatory and other biological activities. Studies have demonstrated that polysaccharides can regulate intestinal microecological disorders. According to the studies in recent years, this review summarizes that polysaccharides mainly modulate intestinal microecological disorders through regulating the composition of intestinal flora, improving the metabolism of the flora, and repairing the intestinal tract barrier. On the basis of these mechanisms of action, this paper elaborates the anti-tumor, immunomodulatory, and anti-inflammatory activities of polysaccharides. This paper can provide reference for the future research on the intestinal microecology-regulating mechanism and biological activities of polysaccharides.

[Characterization and activity effect on ADH of polysaccharides from Mori Fructus].

Mori Fructus polysaccharides (MFPs) have been used as a source of therapeutic agents. The most promising activities of these biopolymers are their immunomodulation and anti-cancer effects. It was reported that polysaccharides were a potential drug against liver injury, but the hepatoprotective effect of MFPs was ambiguous. In this study, the fractionation of crude polysaccharides on DEAE-Cellulose 52 gave four fractions (MFP-1, MFP-2, MFP-2 and MFP-4). The results showed that the contents of carbohydrates were 75.3%, 83.7%, 79.1%, 74.3%, and the molecular weight of them were 112.2, 128.8, 199.5, 181.9 kDa. Monosaccharide component analysis indicated that MFP-1 was composed of galactose, glucose, arabinose, rhamnose and mannose with the molarity rate of 26.8∶20.4∶8.74∶5∶1; MFP-2 contained arabinose, galactose, rhamnose, glucose and galacturonic acid with the molarity rate of 34.2∶38.2∶8∶17.5∶15.1; MFP-3 was composed of galacturonic acid, galactose, glucose, rhamnose and arabinose with the molarity rate of 28.3∶22.6∶20.9∶18.6∶15.1; MFP-4 contained glucose, galactose, rhamnose, galacturonic acid, arabinose and glucuronic acid with the molarity rate of 47.4∶34.9∶36.1∶33.1∶19.9∶4.1. IR analysis's results indicated that MFP-3 and MFP-4 may be polysaccharides containing ß-glycosides. The alcohol dehydrogenase (ADH) activity text showed that, all these four MFPs were found have a positive effect on the activity of ADH, with order: bifendate>MFP-3>MFP-1>MFP-2>tioprnin>MFP-4, and the MFP-3 had the highest activity and demonstrated outstanding hepatic protecting activity.

The Tissue Distribution and Urinary Excretion Study of Gallic Acid and Protocatechuic Acid after Oral Administration of Polygonum Capitatum Extract in Rats.

In the present study, we investigated the tissue distribution and urinary excretion of gallic acid (GA) and protocatechuic acid (PCA) after rat oral administration of aqueous extract of Polygonum capitatum (P. capitatum, named Herba Polygoni Capitati in China). An UHPLC-MS/MS analytical method was developed and adopted for quantification of GA and PCA in different tissue homogenate and urine samples. Interestingly, we found that GA and PCA showed a relatively targeted distribution in kidney tissue after dosing 60 mg/kg P. capitatum extract (equivalent to 12 mg/kg of GA and 0.9 mg/kg of PCA). The concentrations of GA and PCA in the kidney tissue reached 1218.62 ng/g and 43.98 ng/g, respectively, at one hour after oral administration. The results helped explain the empirical use of P. capitatum for kidney diseases in folk medicine. Further studies on urinary excretion of P. capitatum extract indicated that GA and PCA followed a concentrated elimination over a 4-h period. The predominant metabolites were putatively identified to be 4-methylgallic acid (4-OMeGA) and 4-methylprotocatechuic acid (4-OMePCA) by analyzing their precursor ions and characteristic fragment ions using tandem mass spectrometry. However, the amount of unchanged GA and PCA that survived the metabolism were about 14.60% and 15.72% of the total intake, respectively, which is reported for the first time in this study.

[Advance in study on hepatoprotective effects and its mechanism of polysaccharides].

Liver damage is the pathologic status in the liver system, which can lead to cirrhosis, fibrosis and cancer of the liver. So to search for effective drugs on prevention and treatment of anti-hepatic lesion have already attracted broad concern in the world. Polysaccharides widely exist in plants, microorganisms and animals, and have high efficiency but low toxicity properties. Therefore, polysaccharides had been the hotspot in the research field of liver-protecting medicines, and had undergone great progresses. In this study, the hepatoprotective effects and its mechanism of polysaccharides were summarized and reviewed, and the market prospects of development and application were prospected. The research result indicated that polysaccharides derived from plants, microorganisms, animals which had significant effects on liver protection. Results also showed that polysaccharides showed the protective effect on chemical liver injury by anti-oxidation, alleviating calcium overload, adjusting the function of mitochondria, and the protective effect on immune liver injury by regulating cytokine secretion, blocking the complement system activity, inhibiting inflammatory mediator expression, suppressing hepatocyte apoptosis. Polysaccharides had rich resource, diverse bio-effects, abundance approaches and multitarget. Therefore, there is huge potential for developing polysaccharides as novel hepatoprotective medicine candidates.

Studies on Chromatographic Fingerprint and Fingerprinting Profile-Efficacy Relationship of Saxifraga stolonifera Meerb.

This work investigated the spectrum-effect relationships between high performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) fingerprints and the anti-benign prostatic hyperplasia activities of aqueous extracts from Saxifraga stolonifera. The fingerprints of S. stolonifera from various sources were established by HPLC and evaluated by similarity analysis (SA), hierarchical clustering analysis (HCA) and principal component analysis (PCA). Nine samples were obtained from these 24 batches of different origins, according to the results of SA, HCA and the common chromatographic peaks area. A testosterone-induced mouse model of benign prostatic hyperplasia (BPH) was used to establish the anti-benign prostatic hyperplasia activities of these nine S. stolonifera samples. The model was evaluated by analyzing prostatic index (PI), serum acid phosphatase (ACP) activity, concentrations of serum dihydrotestosterone (DHT), prostatic acid phosphatase (PACP) and type II 5α-reductase (SRD5A2). The spectrum-effect relationships between HPLC fingerprints and anti-benign prostatic hyperplasia activities were investigated using Grey Correlation Analysis (GRA) and partial least squares regression (PLSR). The results showed that a close correlation existed between the fingerprints and anti-benign prostatic hyperplasia activities, and peak 14 (chlorogenic acid), peak 17 (quercetin 5-O-ß-d-glucopyranoside) and peak 18 (quercetin 3-O-ß-l-rhamno-pyranoside) in the HPLC fingerprints might be the main active components against anti-benign prostatic hyperplasia. This work provides a general model for the study of spectrum-effect relationships of S. stolonifera by combing HPLC fingerprints with a testosterone-induced mouse model of BPH, which can be employed to discover the principle components of anti-benign prostatic hyperplasia bioactivity.

Adsorption of Cu(2+) and methyl orange from aqueous solutions by activated carbons of corncob-derived char wastes.

Corncob-derived char wastes (CCW) obtained from biomass conversion to syngas production through corncob steam gasification, which were often discarded, were utilized for preparation of activated carbon by calcination, and KOH and HNO3 activation treatments, on the view of environment protection and waste recycling. Their adsorption performance in the removal of heavy metal ions and dye molecules from wastewater was evaluated by using Cu(2+) and methyl orange (MO) as the model pollutant. The surface and structure characteristics of the CCW-based activated carbons (CACs) were investigated by N2 adsorption, CO2 adsorption, FT-IR, and He-TPD. The adsorption capacity varied with the activation methods of CACs and different initial solution concentrations, indicating that the adsorption behavior was influenced by not only the surface area and porosity but also the oxygen functional groups on the surface of the CACs. The equilibrium adsorption data were analyzed with the Langmuir, Freundlich, and Temkin isotherm models, and the adsorption kinetics was evaluated by the pseudo-first-order and pseudo-second-order models.

Ordered mesoporous carbon catalyst for dehydrogenation of propane to propylene.

Metal-free ordered mesoporous carbons were demonstrated to be robust catalysts for direct dehydrogenation of propane to propylene, in the absence of any auxiliary steam, exhibiting high activity and selectivity, as well as long catalytic stability, in comparison with nanostructured carbons.

Increasing the H+ exchange capacity of porous titanium phosphonate materials by protecting defective P-OH groups.

Hierarchically macro-/mesoporous titanium phosphonates with enlarged H(+) exchange capacity were synthesized in the presence of a series of alkyl amines that acted as protective groups for the defective P-OH, which were used as promising solid acid catalysts to replace conventional liquid acid catalysts and acidic resins in some acid-catalytic reactions.