Structure elucidation of acylsucrose derivatives from Atractylodes lanceae rhizome and Atractylodes rhizome.

The mass chromatographic fingerprints of the water extracts of Atractylodes rhizome and Atractylodes lancea rhizome were analyzed by LC-MS. Three new acylsucrose derivatives [2,6,3',6'-tetra(3-methylbutanoyl)sucrose (1), 2,4,3',6'-tetra(3-methylbutanoyl)sucrose (2), and a mixture of 3',4',6'-tris(3-methylbutanoyl)-1'-(2-methylbutanoyl)sucrose and 1',3',4',6'-tetra(3-methylbutanoyl)sucrose (6)), along with three known acylsucroses (2,6,3',4'-tetra(3-methylbutanoyl)sucrose (3), 2,4,3',4'-tetra(3-methylbutanoyl)sucrose (4) and a mixture of 2,3',6'-tris(3-methylbutanoyl)-1'-(2-methylbutanoyl)sucrose and 2,1',3',6'-tetra(3-methylbutanoyl)sucrose (5)] were isolated as the marker compounds of Atractylodes rhizome and Atractylodes lancea rhizome. The structures of the compounds were elucidated by MS/MS analyses and NMR experiments.

Prediction of cyclooxygenase inhibitory activity of curcuma rhizome from chromatograms by multivariate analysis.

The potential use of partial least square regression (PLS-R) models for the prediction of biological activities of a herbal drug based on its liquid chromatography (LC) profile was verified using various extracts of Curcuma phaeocaulis and their cyclooxygenase-2 (COX-2) inhibitory activities as the model experiment. The correlation of practically measured inhibitory activities and predicted values by PLS-R analysis was quite good (correlation coefficient=0.9935) and the possibility of transforming chromatographic information into a measure of biological activity was confirmed. In addition, furanodienone and curcumenol were identified as the major active anti-inflammatory constituents of C. phaeocaulis, through detailed analysis of the regression vector, followed by isolation of these compounds and their COX-2 inhibitory assays. The selectivity indices (SI), IC(50) of COX-1/IC(50) of COX-2, of both compounds were higher than that of indomethacin and it is considered that furanodienone and curcumenol are the most promising compounds as lead anti-inflammatory agents.