Preparative separation of four isomers of synthetic anisodamine by HPLC and diastereomer crystallization.

Anisodamine (654-1), a well-known cholinergic antagonist, is marketed as synthetic anisodamine (mixture of four isomers, 654-2) in China. To preparative resolution and comparison of the bioactivities of the four isomers of synthetic anisodamine, current work explores an economic and effective separation method by using preparative high performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) and diastereomer crystallization. Their absolute configurations were established by single-crystal X-ray diffraction and circular dichroism method. The purities of each isomer were more than 95%. Among them, 654-2-A2 (6R, 2'S configuration) exhibited better effect on cabachol preconditioned small intestine tension more than 654-2 and other isomers. The direct separation method without using HPLC was tried as well, which was still on progress. This is the first report of the method for preparative separation of four isomers of synthetic anisodamine which could be used for large-scale production in industry.

A study of the cardioprotective effect of breviscapine during hypoxia of cardiomyocytes.

Breviscapine is a flavonoid extracted from Erigeron breviscapus. Hand.-Mazz, and it has been reported that breviscapine can activate K+ channels and block Ca2+ channels. In this paper, we studied the cardioprotective effects of breviscapine on electrocardiogram (ECG) changes (ST-segment elevation), infarction size in dog heart subjected to myocardial infarction caused by left coronary artery ligation and lactate dehydrogenase (LDH) leakage, changes of intracellular free Ca2+ levels, apoptosis and necrosis in cultured neonatal rat cardiomyocytes subjected to hypoxia. Additionally, the effect of breviscapine on myocardial oxygen consumption was detected in dog myocardium in vitro. The results showed that breviscapine treatment (1 mg/kg, 2 mg/kg and 4 mg/kg) significantly reduced ST-segment elevation and infarction size in hearts subjected to myocardial infarction, that breviscapine treatment (14.29 microg/mL, 28.57 microg/mL and 57.14 microg/mL) significantly decreased oxygen consumption in myocardium, and that breviscapine treatment (5 microg/mL, 10 microg/mL and 20 microg/mL) significantly reduced LDH leakage, intracellular free Ca2+ levels, apoptosis and necrosis in cardiomyocytes subjected to hypoxia. In conclusion, the present study indicates that breviscapine is in favor of myocardial protection.