Integrating transcriptome and chemical analyses to reveal the anti-Alzheimer’s disease components in Verbena officinalis Linn

Abstract

Verbena officinalis Linn. is a kind of traditional Chinese medicine, which has a long history of application and shows good effects on neuroprotection. Therefore, we consider that V. officinalis may be a potential drug for treating Alzheimer’s disease (AD). First, ultra-performance liquid chromatography-mass spectrometry (UPLC-MS) pointed out that the main chemical components in V. officinalis were iridoid glycosides, phenylethanoid glycosides, and flavonoids. These compounds were used for molecular docking and the results showed that these compounds had good anti-AD activity. To explore the biosynthetic pathway of anti-AD components in V. officinalis, UPLC and ultraviolet (UV) spectrophotometry were used for contents determination and the result was leaf > stem > root. At the same time, 92,867 unigenes were annotated in V. officinalis transcriptome; 206, 229, 115 related unigenes were, respectively, annotated in iridoid glycoside, phenylethanoid glycoside, and flavonoid pathway, of which 61, 73, and 35 were differential expression genes. The components had relatively high expression in leaves, which was consistent with the quantitative results. In addition, the tissue distribution particularity of verbenalin may be related to the branching of pathways. Meanwhile transcription factors VoWRKY6 and VoWRKY7 may be involved in the regulation of iridoid glycoside biosynthesis. Further, VoWRKY3, VoWRKY9, and VoWRKY12 may be related to flavonoid biosynthesis. The above research is helpful to explore the biosynthetic pathway of anti-AD components and the regulation mechanism of active components and to further explore the anti-AD effect of V. officinalis.

Phytochemical Profiling by UPLC‐ESI‐QTOF‐MS of Kalaharia uncinata (Schinz) Moldenke, Widely Used in Traditional Medicine in DR Congo

“…They displayed similar molecular ions at m/z 623.1976 [M−H] − and m/z 625.2132 [M+H] + , suggesting the molecular formula C 29 H 36 O 15 . The mass spectra of compounds 11 and 13 observed in the AcOEt fraction in ESI − mode, exhibited fragment ions at m/z 461 (after the loss of 162 Da or hexose or caffeoyl) and m/z 161 [caffeic acid‐H‐H 2 O] − , that matched with findings of a number of studies [20,33–40,61] for acteoside (verbascoside) and for iso‐acteoside (isoverbascoside) (Figure 4). The fragmentation patterns of verbascoside, [39] are presented in S7 (Supplementary information).…”

“…The abundant fragment ion at m/z 268 [MÀ H-163] À , corresponded to C 15 H 10 O 5 , after the homolytic loss of a hexose moiety, indicating that the aglycone could be a trihydroxyflavone. The highly abundant peak at m/z 268 compared to m/z 269 indicates according to Li et al, [57] [20,[33][34][35][36][37][38][39][40]61] for acteoside (verbascoside) and for iso-acteoside (isoverbascoside) (Figure 4). The fragmentation patterns of verbascoside, [39] are presented in S7 (Supplementary information).…”

Integrating Network Pharmacology and Component Analysis to Study the Potential Mechanisms of Qi-Fu-Yin Decoction in Treating Alzheimer’s Disease

“…AD is a neurodegenerative disease associated with aging, and its clinical manifestations are mainly cognitive dysfunction, 1 behavioral and psychological symptoms, and impairment of daily living functions. 2 , 3 With the aging of the population in the world, AD has not only become a killer disease that threatens the health and even lives of the elderly, 4 but also brings a huge social and economic burden. However, the pathogenesis of AD is complex, and clinical treatment with drugs, at present, is principally limited to symptomatic treatment, 5 which cannot fundamentally prevent or reverse the process of the disease.…”

Ethnobotanical study and characterization of medicinal plants used by the population of the Kisantu and Mbanza-Ngungu territories, Kongo Central Province (DR Congo)

“…Thus, compounds apigenin as the aglycon (Ferreres et al, 2012). Another characteristic fragment ion at m/z 341 [M-H-90] -, also defined according to Ferreres et al (2012), as 270 (aglycone) + 71 Da, was less abundant compared to the fragment ion at m/z 311 and confirmed to be the mono-Cglycosylation (Xu et al, 2007) finding of a number of studies (Attia et al, 2018(Attia et al, , 2018Cui et al, 2016;Darwish et al, 2022;Gao et al, 2022;Kritikou et al, 2020;Li et al, 2021;Peng et al, 2022;Qian et al, 2018;Zhao et al, 2020) for acteoside (verbascoside) and for iso-acteoside (isoverbascoside) (Figure 4.12). The fragmentation patterns of acteoside (Gao et al, 2022;Qian et al, 2018;Zhao et al, 2020) and verbascoside (Attia et al, 2018) are presented in Appendix 22.…”