Institute of Natural Products Research Walter Mors, Federal University of Rio de Janeiro (UFRJ), Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.
Institute of Microbiology Paulo de Góes, Federal University of Rio de Janeiro (IMPG-UFRJ), Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.
Phytother Res. 2022 Apr;36(4):1459-1506. doi: 10.1002/ptr.7359. Epub 2022 Feb 28.
Terpenes are one of the most abundant classes of secondary metabolites produced by plants and can be divided based on the number of isoprene units (C ) in monoterpenes (2 units-C ), sesquiterpenes (3 units-C ), diterpenes (4 units-C ), triterpenes (6 units-C ), etc. Chemically, triterpenes are classified based on their structural skeleton including lanostanes, euphanes, cycloartanes, ursanes, oleananes, lupanes, tirucallanes, cucurbitanes, dammaranes, baccharanes, friedelanes, hopanes, serratanes etc. Additionally, glycosylated (saponins) or highly oxidated/degraded (limonoids) triterpenes could be found in nature. The antiinflammatory effect and action as immunomodulators of these secondary metabolites have been demonstrated in different studies. This review reports an overview of articles published in the last 15 years (from 2006 to 2021 using PubMed and SciFinder database) describing the antiinflammatory effects of different triterpenes with their presumed mechanism of action, suggesting that triterpenes could be appointed as natural products with future pharmaceutical applicability.
萜类化合物是植物产生的最丰富的次生代谢产物之一，可根据异戊二烯单元（C）的数量进行分类：单萜（2 个单元-C）、倍半萜（3 个单元-C）、二萜（4 个单元-C）、三萜（6 个单元-C）等。从化学角度来看，三萜根据其结构骨架进行分类，包括羊毛甾烷、桉烷、环阿尔廷烷、乌苏烷、齐墩果烷、羽扇豆烷、雷公藤烷、葫芦烷、达玛烷、补骨脂烷、法呢烷、鲨烷、甾体等。此外，天然存在的三萜还可能存在糖基化（皂苷）或高度氧化/降解（柠檬苦素）。这些次生代谢物的抗炎作用和免疫调节剂作用已在不同的研究中得到证实。本综述报告了过去 15 年（2006 年至 2021 年，使用 PubMed 和 SciFinder 数据库）发表的描述不同三萜类化合物抗炎作用及其推测作用机制的文章概述，表明三萜类化合物可能被指定为具有未来药物应用前景的天然产物。
