Dai Xiao-Min, Cui Dong-Ni, Wang Jing, Zhang Wei, Zhang Zun-Jian, Xu Feng-Guo
Key Laboratory of Drug Quality Control and Pharmacovigilance, Ministry of Education, China Pharmaceutical University, Nanjing, China.
State Key Laboratory of Natural Medicines, China Pharmaceutical University, Nanjing, China.
Front Pharmacol. 2018 Mar 20;9:236. doi: 10.3389/fphar.2018.00236. eCollection 2018.
The quality control research of traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) is lagged far behind the space of progress in modernization and globalization. Thus the concept of quality marker (Q-marker) was proposed recently to guide the quality investigations of TCM. However, how to discover and validate the Q-marker is still a challenge. In this paper, a system pharmacology based strategy was proposed to discover Q-marker of HuangQin decoction (HQD) to attenuate Intestinal Damage. Using this strategy, nine measurable compounds including paeoniflorin, baicalin, scutellarein, liquiritigenin, norwogonin, baicalein, glycyrrhizic acid, wogonin, and oroxylin A were screened out as potential markers. Standard references of these nine compounds were pooled together as components combination according to their corresponding concentration in HQD. The bioactive equivalence between components combination and HQD was validated using wound healing test and inflammatory factor determination experiment. The comprehensive results indicated that components combination is almost bioactive equivalent to HQD and could serve as the Q-markers. In conclusion, our study put forward a promising strategy for Q-markers discovery.
中药（TCM）的质量控制研究远远落后于现代化和全球化的发展步伐。因此，质量标志物（Q-marker）的概念最近被提出以指导中药的质量研究。然而，如何发现和验证Q-marker仍然是一个挑战。本文提出了一种基于系统药理学的策略来发现黄芩汤（HQD）减轻肠道损伤的Q-marker。利用该策略，筛选出9种可测量的化合物，包括芍药苷、黄芩苷、黄芩素、甘草素、去甲黄芩素、黄芩苷元、甘草酸、汉黄芩素和木犀草素A作为潜在标志物。根据这9种化合物在HQD中的相应浓度，将它们的标准品混合在一起作为成分组合。通过伤口愈合试验和炎症因子测定实验验证了成分组合与HQD之间的生物活性等效性。综合结果表明，成分组合与HQD几乎具有生物活性等效性，可作为Q-标志物。总之，我们的研究提出了一种有前景的Q-标志物发现策略。
