Identification of Chinese green tea (Camellia sinensis) marker metabolites using GC/MS and UPLC-QTOF/MS.

Tea is one of the most widely consumed aromatic beverages in the world because of its taste and flavor, as well as due to many potential health beneficial properties. Metabolomics focuses on an in-depth analysis of all metabolites in living organisms. In this study, 29 primary metabolites and 25 secondary metabolites were identified using GC/MS and UPLC-QTOF/MS, respectively. Further, PCA analysis showed conspicuous discrimination for the ten varieties of green tea with metabolite profiling. Among them, organic acids, amino acids, flavan-3-ols, and flavonol glycosides varied greatly through checking the VIP values of the PLS-DA model. Moreover, the intrinsic and/or extrinsic factors characterizing each type of green tea were also discussed. The chemical component marker derived here should be used as an important detection index, while evaluating the tea quality, as well as while establishing the tea quality standard. SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1007/s10068-021-00970-4.

Enhancement of Protective Effects of Radix Scutellariae on UVB-induced Photo Damage in Human HaCaT Keratinocytes.

Radix Scutellariae (RS) has long been used in the treatment of inflammatory and allergic diseases. Its main flavonoids, baicalin (BG) and wogonoside (WG), can be hydrolyzed into their corresponding aglycones, baicalein (B) and wogonin (W). In this study, we developed a safe and effective method of transforming these glycosides using Peclyve PR. The transformation rate of BG and WG reached 98.5 and 98.1%, respectively, with 10% enzyme at 40 °C for 60 h. Furthermore, we compared the anti-photoaging activity of RS before and after enzyme treatment, as well as their respective main components, in UVB-irradiated HaCaT cells. Results found that enzyme-treated RS (ERS) appeared to be much better at preventing UVB-induced photoaging than RS. ERS significantly inhibited the upregulation of matrix metalloproteinase-1 and IL-6 caused by UVB radiation by inactivating the MAPK/AP-1 and NF-κB/IκB-α signaling pathways. ERS treatment also recovered UVB-induced reduction of procollagen type I by activating the TGF-ß/Smad pathway. In addition, ERS exhibited an excellent antioxidant activity, which could increase the expression of cytoprotective antioxidants such as HO-1 and NQ-O1, by facilitating Nrf2 nuclear transfer. These findings demonstrated that the photoprotective effects of RS were significantly improved by enzyme-modified biotransformation.