A systematic approach for authentication of medicinal Patrinia species using an integration of morphological, chemical and molecular methods.

Four common Patrinia species, including P. heterophylla, P. monandra, P. scabiosifolia and P. villosa, have been documented as herbal medicines with various clinical applications, such as anti-cancer, anti-diarrhea and sedative. However, the authentication of medicinal Patrinia species poses a problem, particularly with the processed herbal materials. This study aimed to systematically authenticate the four medicinal Patrinia species in the market using morphological and chemical characterization, as well as DNA markers. We found the species identity authenticated by traditional morphologies were in good agreement with both chemical and molecular results. The four species showed species-specific patterns in chromatographic profiles with distinct chemical markers. We also revealed the power of complete chloroplast genomes in species authentication. The sequences of targeted loci, namely atpB, petA, rpl2-rpl23 and psaI-ycf4, contained informative nucleotides for the species differentiation. Our results also facilitate authentication of medicinal Patrinia species using new DNA barcoding markers. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first report on the application of morphology, chemical fingerprinting, complete chloroplast genomes and species-specific Insertion-Deletions (InDels) in differentiating Patrinia species. This study reported on the power of a systematic, multidisciplinary approach in authenticating medicinal Patrinia species.

Distal clavicle fractures treated by anteroinferior plating with a single screw: Two case reports.

BACKGROUND: For the treatment of distal clavicle fractures, each treatment method has its own advantages and disadvantages, and there is no optimal surgical solution. CASE SUMMARY: Based on this, we report 2 cases of distal clavicle fractures treated utilizing an anterior inferior plate with a single screw placed in the distal, in anticipation of providing a better surgical approach to distal clavicle fracture treatment. Two patients were admitted to the hospital after trauma with a diagnosis of distal clavicle fracture, and were admitted to the hospital for internal fixation of clavicle fracture by incision and reduction, with good postoperative functional recovery. CONCLUSION: With solid postoperative fixation and satisfactory prognostic functional recovery, this technique has been shown to be simple, easy to perform and effective.

Effect of phenolic compounds and hydroxyl content on the physicochemical properties of pine nut oil Pickering emulsions.

BACKGROUND: For decades, pine nut oil Pickering emulsions have been stabilized using a covalent composite of two phenolic chemicals (tannic acid, TA; and gallic acid, GA) and whey protein isolate (WPI) following alkali treatment. Based on covalent composite particles being excellent sources of high-quality stabilizers, this research explored the influence of phenolic addition and hydroxyl content on stability, rheological parameters and characterization of Pickering emulsions. RESULTS: Tannic acid was more effective in reducing the average particle size of the emulsion, which decreased from 479.4 ± 2.1 nm without addition to between 187.6 ± 5.9 and 368.2 ± 16.8 nm (P < 0.05). The potential values of all the emulsions were between -30 and -50 mV (except for the gallic acid addition of 2.5 g kg-1 ). When the phenolic addition was 7.5 g kg-1 , emulsions demonstrated the best emulsification ability. Pickering emulsion stabilized by WPI-TA and WPI-GA particles were successfully generated, according to confocal laser scanning microscopy. Rheological results showed that the increase of phenolic addition contributed to larger elastic modulus (G'), viscosity modulus (G″) and viscosity of emulsions, which was beneficial to the stability of emulsions. CONCLUSION: Both phenolic compounds significantly improved the physicochemical stability of the emulsions (P < 0.05) and their oxidative stability. Covalently crosslinking phenolic compounds to proteins is a better method to prepare stable emulsions. It is more prominent that TA shows a more significant improvement in emulsion stability due to the number of hydroxyl groups it can provide. This research might serve as a theoretical foundation for enhancing the quality of pine nut oil-related products. © 2022 Society of Chemical Industry.

High-throughput metabolomic method based on liquid chromatography: high resolution mass spectrometry with chemometrics for metabolic biomarkers and pathway analysis to reveal the protective effects of baicalin on thyroid cancer.

Cell metabonomics focuses on discovering metabolic biomarkers and pathway changes in cells from biological systems to obtain the cell properties and functional information under different conditions. Baicalin possesses various pharmacological activities, and plays a vital role in the oncology research field. However, the detailed mechanism of its action is still unclear. In this work, we employed ultra-high performance liquid chromatography-mass spectrometry (UPLC-MS) based non-targeted metabolomics method associated with chemometrics analysis to explore metabolic pathways and biomarkers for investigating the efficacy and pharmacological targets of baicalin against thyroid cancer cells. In addition, morphological observation, parameter calculation of cell proliferation and apoptosis were carried out, which assisted in elucidation of pharmacological activity of baicalin on the human thyroid cancer cells. The results showed that baicalin possesses an intense stimulative apoptosis and inhibits proliferation activity on SW579 human thyroid cancer cells, and partially reversed the cell metabolite abnormalities. A total of nineteen differentiated metabolites in SW579 cells were identified and deemed as potential biomarkers after the baicalin treatment, involving nine metabolic pathways, such as taurine and hypotaurine metabolism, pyrimidine metabolism, fructose and mannose metabolism, steroid hormone biosynthesis and sphingolipid metabolism. High-throughput non-targeted metabolomics provide an insight into specialized mechanism of baicalin against thyroid cancer and contributes to novel drug discovery and thyroid cancer management in clinical practice.

Rapid separation, identification and analysis of Astragalus membranaceus Fisch using liquid chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry.

A rapid, sensitive and selective liquid chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry (HPLC-MS-MS) method has been developed for the rapid separation and structural identification of constituents in Astragali Radix (AR) The analysis was conducted on an ACQUITY HPLC chromatographic instrument and a mass spectrometer using positive electrospray ionization. Using a fast HPLC system with an ACQUITY HPLC BEH C18 column, the total analysis time for this complex herb was less than 30 min. The method used a column with 1.7 µm particle packing, which allowed a higher speed of analysis, peak capacity, greater resolution and increased sensitivity. With various fragmentor voltage levels in MS, accurate mass measurements (less than 5 ppm error) for molecular ions and characteristic fragment ions represented reliable identification criteria for these compounds. The constituents of AR were identified or tentatively characterized based on their retention times, mass fragmentation behavior, MS-MS fragment ions, literature reports and the establishment of an in-house molecular formula database. With this method, a total of 22 compounds of AR were tentatively identified based on MS data and comparison with available databases. In conclusion, fast HPLC with MS is a highly useful and efficient technique to separate and identify constituents in complex matrices of herbal medicines.