Beijing Hospital of Traditional Chinese Medicine, Capital Medical University, Beijing, China.
Beijing Institute of Chinese Medicine, Beijing, China.
Biotechnol Genet Eng Rev. 2024 Nov;40(3):2888-2909. doi: 10.1080/02648725.2023.2202544. Epub 2023 Apr 17.
Houtt is an important anti-skin pigmentation herb used in traditional Chinese medicine. However, the molecular basis for this activity is complex and not fully understood. In this study, water and ethanol extracts and polysaccharide extract from (LJPs) were analyzed by LC-MS/MS and HPLC-DAD separately. Cytotoxicity was analyzed by using CCK-8, antioxidant activity using flow cytometer, anti-MMPs, anti-tyrosinase and signalling pathway analysis using Western blotting to investigate their anti-melanogenesis function. The results showed that the water and ethanol extracts contained alkaloids, flavonoids, and phenolic acids. The LJPs mainly contain glucose, fucose, glucuronic acid, mannose, threonine and arginine, and structure characterization by FITR analyses indicated that LJPs have β- or α-D-glycosidic bonds and contain pyranose rings. The extracts displayed high cell viability at their maximum concentration. The water extract and polysaccharides significantly reduced lipopolysaccharide (LPS)-induced intracellular reactive oxygen species (ROS) content and exhibited a cytoprotective role. Also, these extracts displayed higher matrix metalloproteinase-2 (anti-MMP-2), anti-MMP-9 and anti-tyrosinase activities. Furthermore, the polysaccharides displayed significantly greater inhibitory effect on intracellular ROS and tyrosinase protein expression than α-arbutin and ursolic acid used for the clinical treatment of skin pigmentation. This study also investigated the polysaccharide inhibition of melanin synthesis by repressing the expression of melanocytic lineage-specific transcription factor (MITF) and melanogenic enzymes via modulation of the phosphoinositide 3-kinase (PI3K-Akt-mTOR) and β-catenin pathways. The overall results indicate that is a promising candidate for anti-pigmentation treatment.
厚朴是一种重要的用于中药的抗皮肤色素沉着草药。然而，这种活性的分子基础很复杂，尚未完全理解。在这项研究中，我们分别通过 LC-MS/MS 和 HPLC-DAD 分析了 （LJPs）的水提物和醇提物以及多糖提取物。通过 CCK-8 分析细胞毒性，通过流式细胞仪分析抗氧化活性，通过 Western blot 分析抗-MMPs、抗酪氨酸酶和信号通路分析来研究其抗黑色素生成功能。结果表明，水提物和醇提物含有生物碱、黄酮类化合物和酚酸。LJPs 主要含有葡萄糖、岩藻糖、葡萄糖醛酸、甘露糖、苏氨酸和精氨酸，FITR 结构分析表明 LJPs 具有β-或α-D-糖苷键，并且含有吡喃糖环。提取物在最大浓度时显示出高细胞活力。水提物和多糖显著降低脂多糖（LPS）诱导的细胞内活性氧（ROS）含量，并表现出细胞保护作用。此外，这些提取物表现出更高的基质金属蛋白酶-2（抗-MMP-2）、抗-MMP-9 和抗酪氨酸酶活性。此外，多糖对细胞内 ROS 和酪氨酸酶蛋白表达的抑制作用明显大于用于临床治疗皮肤色素沉着的α-熊果苷和熊果酸。本研究还通过调节磷酸肌醇 3-激酶（PI3K-Akt-mTOR）和β-连环蛋白途径来抑制黑素细胞谱系特异性转录因子（MITF）和黑素生成酶的表达，研究了多糖对黑色素合成的抑制作用。总体结果表明，厚朴是一种有前途的抗色素沉着治疗候选药物。
