Anti-Allergic and Anti-Inflammatory Triterpenes from the Herb of Prunella vulgaris

Abstract

The activity-guided fractionation of the extract of the herb of Prunella vulgaris (Labiatae) led to the isolation of four triterpenes, i.e., betulinic acid, ursolic acid, 2 alpha,3 alpha-dihydroxyurs-12-en-28-oic acid, and 2 alpha-hydroxyursolic acid. One of these compounds, 2 alpha,3 alpha-dihydroxyursolic acid, demonstrated significant inhibition on the release of beta-hexosaminidase from the cultured RBL-2H3 cells in a dose-dependent manner; the IC50 value was calculated to be 57 microM. When the isolated compounds were tested for their effects on the production of nitric oxide from cultured murine macrophages, RAW 264.7 cells, ursolic acid and 2 alpha-hydroxyursolic acid exhibited strong inhibitory activities (IC50 values, 17 and 27 microM, respectively).

Changes in bioactive components related to the harvest time from the spicas ofPrunella vulgaris

“…Previous phytochemical studies on the biologically active components of P. vulgaris have been isolated and reported to mainly contain triterpenoids, phenolics, flavonoids, tannins, caffeic acids, and anionic polysaccharide prunelline (Ryu et al, 2000;Wang et al, 2000;Jiang et al, 2008). Rosmarinic acid (RA), one of the major phenolics, suppresses lipoperoxidation (Laranjinha et al, 1994), scavenges superoxide radicals (Osakabe et al, 2002), and exhibits anti-inflammatory (Osakabe et al, 2004) and antioxidant (Psotova et al, 2003) bioactivity.…”

Betulinic acid protects against ischemia/reperfusion‐induced renal damage and inhibits leukocyte apoptosis

“…Triterpenoids are almost ubiquitous in plants and have long been considered to be the antiinfl ammatory principles of several drugs, particularly in the form of triterpene glycosides. The reported biological effects of triterpenoids include cytotoxic, antitumor, antiinfl ammatory and antiviral activities (Recio et al, 1995;Fulda and Debatin, 2000;Ryu et al, 2000). In 1995, betulinic acid was reported to be a selective inhibitor of human melanoma (Pisha et al, 1995).…”

Antioxidant Activity of Different Solvent Fractions from Prunella vulgaris var. lilacina

“…lilacina ameliorated drug-induced memory dysfunction (Park et al, 2010) and showed anti-allergic and anti-inflammatory activity (Ryu et al, 2000;Psotová et al, 2003). Previous studies indicated that the Prunella vulgaris var.…”

“…lilacina is one of the most widely used medical plants in north-eastern Asian countries and have been used for traditional herbal medicine to treat fever, inflammation, dropsy, gonorrhea and cancer (Park et al, 2010). Although several studies have reported that it has many biological activities (Ryu et al, 2000;Psotová et al, 2003), little is known to regarding its antioxidant properties which is related to these beneficial properties. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the several fractions (n-Hexane, CHCl 3 , n-BuOH, and H 2 O) from 70% EtOH crude extract of Prunella vulgaris var.…”