Antioxidant, α-Amylase and α-Glucosidase Inhibitory Activities and Potential Constituents of Canarium tramdenum Bark.

The fruits of Canarium tramdenum are commonly used as foods and cooking ingredients in Vietnam, Laos, and the southeast region of China, whilst the leaves are traditionally used for treating diarrhea and rheumatism. This study was conducted to investigate the potential use of this plant bark as antioxidants, and α-amylase and α-glucosidase inhibitors. Five different extracts of C. tramdenum bark (TDB) consisting of the extract (TDBS) and factional extracts hexane (TDBH), ethyl acetate (TDBE), butanol (TDBB), and water (TDBW) were evaluated. The TDBS extract contained the highest amount of total phenolic (112.14 mg gallic acid equivalent per g dry weight), while the TDBB extract had the most effective antioxidant capacity compared to other extracts. Its IC50 values were 12.33, 47.87, 33.25, and 103.74 µg/mL in 2,2-diphenyl-1-picrylhydrazyl (DPPH), 2,2'-azino-bis (ABTS), reducing power (RP), and nitric oxide (NO) assays, respectively. Meanwhile, the lipid peroxidation inhibition of the four above extracts was proximate to that of butylated hydroxytoluene (BHT) as a standard antioxidant. The result of porcine pancreatic α-amylase inhibition showed that TDB extracts have promising effects which are in line with the commercial diabetic inhibitor acarbose. Interestingly, the inhibitory ability on α-glucosidase of all the extracts was higher than that of acarbose. Among the extracts, the TDBB extract expressed the strongest activity on the enzymatic reaction (IC50 = 18.93 µg/mL) followed by the TDBW extract (IC50 = 25.27 µg/mL), TDBS (IC50 = 28.17 µg/mL), and TDBE extract (IC50 = 141.37 µg/mL). The phytochemical constituents of the TDB extract were identified by gas chromatography⁻mass spectrometry (GC-MS). The principal constituents included nine phenolics, eight terpenoids, two steroids, and five compounds belonging to other chemical classes, which were the first reported in this plant. Among them, the presence of α- and ß-amyrins were identified by GC-MS and appeared as the most dominant constituents in TDB extracts (1.52 mg/g). The results of this study revealed that C. tramdenum bark possessed rich phenolics and terpenoids, which might confer on reducing risks from diabetes. A high quantity of α- and ß-amyrins highlighted the potentials of anti-inflammatory, anti-ulcer, anti-hyperlipidemic, anti-tumor, and hepatoprotective properties of C. tramdenum bark.

Whole-Genome Characteristics and Polymorphic Analysis of Vietnamese Rice Landraces as a Comprehensive Information Resource for Marker-Assisted Selection.

Next generation sequencing technologies have provided numerous opportunities for application in the study of whole plant genomes. In this study, we present the sequencing and bioinformatic analyses of five typical rice landraces including three indica and two japonica with potential blast resistance. A total of 688.4 million 100 bp paired-end reads have yielded approximately 30-fold coverage to compare with the Nipponbare reference genome. Among them, a small number of reads were mapped to both chromosomes and organellar genomes. Over two million and eight hundred thousand single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) and insertions and deletions (InDels) in indica and japonica lines have been determined, which potentially have significant impacts on multiple transcripts of genes. SNP deserts, contiguous SNP-low regions, were found on chromosomes 1, 4, and 5 of all genomes of rice examined. Based on the distribution of SNPs per 100 kilobase pairs, the phylogenetic relationships among the landraces have been constructed. This is the first step towards revealing several salient features of rice genomes in Vietnam and providing significant information resources to further marker-assisted selection (MAS) in rice breeding programs.