The effects of different extraction temperatures (4 and 80 °C) on the physicochemical properties and antitumor activity of water soluble polysaccharides (CMPs-4 and CMPs-80) from Cordyceps militaris (C. militaris) were evaluated in this study. The results of gas chromatography (GC) and high-performance gel permeation chromatography (HPGPC) showed that a higher extraction temperature could degrade the polysaccharides with 188 kDa, mainly composed of glucose, and increase the dissolution rate of polysaccharides about 308 kDa, mainly consisting of rhamnose and galactose. In addition, the CMPs displayed the same sugar ring and category of glycosidic linkage based on Fourier-transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR) analysis, however, their invisible structural difference occurred in the specific rotation and conformational characteristics according to the results of specific optical rotation measurement and Congo red test. In vitro antitumor experiments indicated that CMPs-4 possessed stronger inhibitory effects on human esophagus cancer Eca-109 cells by inducing cell apoptosis more than CMPs-80 did. These findings demonstrated that the polysaccharides extracted with cold water (4 °C) could be applied as a novel alternative chemotherapeutic agent or dietary supplement with its underlying antitumor property.

Clivia is a genus of great horticultural importance and has been widely cultivated as ornamental plants in all over the world. In order to assess the phylogenetic relationships and genetic diversity of the wild Clivia species and cultivars, we isolated AC-enriched repeats using FIASCO from a single clone each of C. miniata Regel. and Clivia nobilis Lindl. Of the fourteen repeats, 10 were polymorphic and 4 were monomorphic. The polymorphic marker loci were characterized using 61 Clivia accessions. The number of alleles ranged from two to six, observed heterozygosity ranged from 0.04 to 1.00 and expected heterozygosity ranged from 0.04 to 0.83. These microsatellite marker loci provide tools for future studies of Clivia species and cultivars.