Many common diseases like diabetes, cardiovascular disease, and cancer are caused or exacerbated by disparate physiological, pathological, environmental, and lifestyle factors. However, the chief aim of current drug discovery approaches is to search for single-entity drugs that interact with well-defined molecular targets (a single receptor or enzyme). The concept of multi-target drugs or multi-component therapy is gaining increased attention with the discovery that many diseases (like hypertension) are best treated by multi-drug or multi-target therapies. Traditional medicines, such as traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) and Indian Ayurveda, have been re-evaluated and are becoming important resources for the discovery of bioactive molecules with therapeutic effects and for designing multi-targets drugs. This article provides an overview of new strategies and techniques to design therapeutic regimes that comprise more than one active ingredient to produce synergistic effects by simultaneously interacting with multiple molecular targets. Advances in phytochemistry, high throughput screening, DNA sequencing, systems biology, and bioinformatics can reveal the chemical composition and molecular mechanisms of TCM and together provide a new template for the early stages of drug discovery. Meanwhile, clinical knowledge of TCM provides a promising framework for multi-component drug design. A renaissance of multi-component drug discovery inspired by traditional medicine is possible.

Psoralea corylifolia L. (Fabaceae) is a widely used medical plant in China. This study was designed to screen and identify bioactive compounds with anticancer activity from the seeds of Psoralea corylifolia L. One volatile fraction (fraction I) and three other fractions (fraction II, III, IV) from methanol extraction of P. corylifolia L. were obtained. Bioactivities of these fractions were evaluated by the cytotoxicity on KB, KBv200, K562, K562/ADM cancer cells with MTT assay. Major components in the active fraction were identified by HPLC/MSn. Fraction IV significantly inhibits the growth of cancer cells in a dose-dependent manner. The IC50 values were 21.6, 24.4, 10.0 and 26.9, respectively. Psoralen and isopsoralen, isolated from fraction IV, were subject to bioactive assay and presented a dose-dependent anticancer activity in four cancer cell lines (KB, KBv200, K562 and K562/ADM). The IC50 values of psoralen were 88.1, 86.6, 24.4 and 62.6, which of isopsoralen were 61.9, 49.4, 49.6 and 72.0, respectively. Apoptosis of tumor cell significantly increased after treated with psoralen and isopsoralen. Induction of apoptotic activity was confirmed by flow cytometry after staining with Annexin V/PI. These results suggested psoralen and isopsoralen contribute to anticancer effect of P. corylifolia L.

Erigeron breviscapus is an important herbal drug for the treatment of cardiovascular and cerebral vessel diseases. In this study, phenolic compounds were extracted from the whole plant of E. breviscapus and analyzed by high-performance liquid chromatography/electrospray ionization mass spectrometry. A total of 53 compounds were identified or tentatively characterized based on their UV and mass spectra. These compounds included caffeoylquinic acids (CQAs), CQA glucosides, malonyl-CQAs, acetyl-CQAs, caffeoyl-2,7-anhydro-3-deoxy-2-octulopyranosonic acids (CDOAs), caffeoyl-2,7-anhydro-2-octulopyranosonic acids (COAs), flavones, flavonols and flavonones. Most of them were reported for the first time from E. breviscapus and nineteen of them belonged to new compounds. The MS(n) spectra of CQA glucosides were similar to CQAs and they were discriminated by their retention times. No caffeic acid related ions (X(0) (-), Y(0) (-) and Z(0) (-)) were observed in MS(n) spectra of acyl-CQAs compared to those of CQAs. Fragment ions ((2,5)O(-), (3,6)O(-) and (4,6)O(-)) corresponding to ring cleavage were shown in MS(n) spectra of CDOAs and COAs, characteristic of this class of compounds. The 5,6,7-trihydroxyl-substituted flavones were dominant in E. breviscapus. Their [A--H](-) ions underwent the loss of a molecule of H(2)O, followed by the loss of CO, which was used to discriminate from other hydroxyl-substituted flavones. Our results are the first comprehensive analysis of E. breviscapus constituents and will be helpful for the quality control of the herb of E. breviscapus and its related preparations.

A metabonomic study was performed to investigate the biochemical perturbation of the serum samples from liver failure patients induced by hepatitis B virus (HBV; n=24) and control normal subjects (n=23). The serum metabonome was detected using gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (GC-MS) technique integrated with a commercial mass spectral library for the peak identification. After peak deconvolution, identification, and matching, the acquired GC-MS data were normalized and processed by principal component analysis (PCA) and canonical discriminant analysis (CDA). Specific changes in the metabolic composition of serum samples from patients including amino acids (AAs) and glucose were shown in GC-MS total ion current (TIC) chromatograms. The distinctive biochemical difference between the healthy subjects and liver failure patients was displayed by the pattern recognition methods. We also found that the liver failure patients with different degree of severity categorized as MELD (model for end-stage of liver diseases) could be clearly classified by the corresponding metabonomic data. In comparison, the current routine clinical indices cannot characterize the global phenotyping of liver failure. The result demonstrated that the GC-MS technique is an alternative tool for the characterization of the metabolic perturbation and the metabonomic study promises to provide an integrative criterion to evaluate the severity and the prognosis of liver diseases.

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droxy-6-(hydroxymethyl)oxan-2-yl]oxyoxane-3,4,5-triol dihydrate (trehalose dihydrate), and (3S,4S,5S,6R)-6-(hydroxymethyl)oxane-2,3,4,5-tetrol (mannose) in the mixtures of ethanol and water from (278.2 to 298.2) K were determined. The solubilities of all the four saccharides in ethanol−water mixtures increased as equilibrium temperature increased. The solubilities of trehalose dihydrate, xylose, and mannose decreased as ethanol mass fraction in the mixed solvent increased. Maltose monohydrate solubility decreased when ethanol mass fraction in the mixed solvent was less than 0.9. The solubilities of xylose and mannose were predicted with A-UNIFAC, and the average relative deviations (ARD) values were less than 22 %. The solubilities of maltose monohydrate and trehalose dihydrate were calculated with the modified UNIQUAC model. New interaction parameters were calibrated. The ARD values for trehalose dihydrate solubility and maltose monohydrate solubility are 28.6 % and 17.9 %, respectively.

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In this paper, we investigated the analytical potential of the use of single-walled carbon nanotubes (SWNTs) with different dispersion as additives in MEEKC. The addition of surfactant-coated single-walled carbon nanotubes (SC-SWNTs) in microemulsion provided a more efficient method than carboxylic SWNTs for the separation of three flavonoids and six phenolic acids depending on the interaction between the analytes and SWNTs surface. Additionally, the effect of important factors was examined by changing experimental variables such as the dispersion of SWNTs, surfactants and cosurfactants. Finally, the MEEKC method using SC-SWNTs was successfully applied to complex natural products (drug pair of Radix Astragali and Radix et Rhizoma Salvia Miltiorrhizae), with satisfactory results.