The effect of medicinal plants of Islamabad and Murree region of Pakistan on insulin secretion from INS‐1 cells

Abstract

In vitro testing of the extracts of medicinal plants collected from Islamabad and the Murree region on insulin secretagogue activity was carried out. Dried ethanol extracts of all plants (ZH1-ZH19) were dissolved in ethanol and DMSO, and tested at various concentrations (between 1 and 40 microg/mL) for insulin release from INS-1 cells in the presence of 5.5 mM glucose. Glibenclamide was used as a control. Promising insulin secretagogue activity in various plant extracts at 1, 10, 20 and 40 microg/mL was found, while in some cases a decrease in insulin secretion was also observed. Artemisia roxburghiana, Salvia coccinia and Monstera deliciosa showed insulin secretagogue activity at 1 microg/mL (p < 0.05) while Abies pindrow, Centaurea iberica and Euphorbia helioscopia were active at 10 microg/mL (p < 0.05). Extracts of Bauhinia variegata and Bergenia himalacia showed effects at 20 microg/mL (p < 0.05), and Taraxacum officinale and Viburnum foetens at 40 microg/mL (p < 0.05). Insulin secretagogue activity could not be detected in the extracts of Adhatoda vasica, Cassia fistula, Chrysanthemum leucanthemum, Morus alba, Plectranthus rugosus, Peganum harmala and Olea ferruginea. The results suggest that medicinal plants of Islamabad and the Murree region of Pakistan may be potential natural resources for antidiabetic compounds.

Protein tyrosine phosphatase 1B inhibitors isolated from Artemisia roxburghiana

“…Apart from some preliminary studies showing the in vitro insulin secretagogue activity A. roxburghiana 10 , scientific data to justify the antidiabetic traditional uses of the plant is not available. In the present study, PTP1B inhibitory activity was used as a validated target for sourcing potentially useful antidiabetic compounds from the plant.…”

“…The aerial parts are also used to treat diabetes either alone or in combination with other plants, such as the dried fruits of Zizyphus jujube 9 . In support of this latter traditional use, the ethanolic extract of A. roxburghiana from Pakistan has previously shown to display insulin secretagogue activity in cultured insulinoma cell line, INS-1 cells 10 . Apart from preliminary phytochemical studies, such as essential oils analysis by GC-MS [9][10][11] , the active antidiabetic principles of the plants have not yet been investigated.…”

“…In support of this latter traditional use, the ethanolic extract of A. roxburghiana from Pakistan has previously shown to display insulin secretagogue activity in cultured insulinoma cell line, INS-1 cells 10 . Apart from preliminary phytochemical studies, such as essential oils analysis by GC-MS [9][10][11] , the active antidiabetic principles of the plants have not yet been investigated. Owing to the prominent role of PTP1B in diabetes, we herewith identified the active components of A. roxburghiana using this pharmacological target.…”

Determination of unifloral honey volatiles fromCentaurea ibericaandZizyphus spinachristiby solid-phase microextraction and gas chromatography-mass spectrometry

“…It is known locally as Murar and has been used in traditional medicine to treat many diseases, such as cancer, microbial infections, stimulant, tonic, antidiabetic, diuretic, and antirheumatic [6][7][8][9][10][11][12][13][14][15]. Several reports mentioned anti-inflammatory, wound healing, and insulin secretion activities of the plant extract [16,17]. More recently, new potent anti-platelet constituents were isolated and identified [18].…”

Evaluation of Antinociceptive and Anti-Inflammatory Activities of a New Triterpene Saponin from Bauhinia variegata Leaves

“…The roots are used as antidote to snake poison (Reddy and Yadava, 2003). Many plants of the genus are used in traditional medicine because of their interesting biological activities such as analgesic (El-Khatib and Kaleel, 1995), astringent, diuretic (Braca et al, 2001) anti-infl ammatory (Pokhrel et al, 2002;El-Khatib et al, 1995;Braca et al, 2001;Sosa et al, 2002), antimicrobial Kittakoop et al, 2004), antimalarial (Kittakoop et al, 2000), antipyretic (El-Khatib et al, 1995), antioxidant (Braca et al, 2001;Kumar et al, 2005;De Sousa et al, 2004), hypoglycemic (De Sousa et al, 2004), cytotoxic (Rajkapoor et al, 2003(Rajkapoor et al, , 2006, and antidiabetic (Braca et al, 2001;Hussain et al, 2004). Several Bauhinia species have already been chemically studied and found to contain mainly fl avonoids (Braca et al, 2001;Yadava and Reddy, 2001;Salatino et al, 1999;Yadava and Tripathi, 2000;Jain et al, 2004;Wollenweber et al, 2000) besides cinnamic acids (Braca et al, 2001), phenanthraquinone (Zhao et al, 2005), sterols (Iribarren and Pomilio, 1987), and triterpenoidal saponins (Athikomkulchai et al, 2003).…”