Tracking antiangiogenic components fromGlycyrrhiza uralensis Fisch. based on zebrafish assays using high-speed countercurrent chromatography Natural products are some of the most important sources of lead compounds for drug discovery. The advanced isolation technique of lead compounds of natural origin using therapeutically relevant bioassays is capable of enhancing work efficiency from complex multiconstituent extracts. In the present study, a bioassay-guided isolation strategy combined with bioactivity screening was used to identify novel angiogenesis inhibitors from licorice (Glycyrrhiza uralensis Fisch.) based on the zebrafish model and rapid preparative separation by high-speed countercurrent chromatography. Zebrafish embryos at 24 h postfertilization were chosen as the angiogenesis inhibition model for bioactivity screening. A solvent system (n-hexane-ethyl acetate-methanol-water) with different ratios was optimized and applied in the high-speed countercurrent chromatography separation of two fractions, Fr5 and Fr6, from the ethyl acetate extract of licorice. Blood circulation and vascular outgrowth in intersegmental vessels were found to be simultaneously inhibited by isoliquiritigenin and isolicoflavonol in a dose-dependent manner. Thus, these two compounds were identified and considered as active inhibitors against angiogenesis. These experimental results indicate that zebrafish bioassays combined with high-speed countercurrent chromatography may provide an alternative pathway for the rapid isolation of bioactive natural products.

Abstract:In this study, we cloned the full-length cDNA of E-selectin of zebrafish (Danio rerio), analyzed its expression pattern and preliminarily explored its biological function. Zebrafish E-selectin cDNA is 3146 bp and encodes a putative 871 amino acid protein. All structural domains involved in E-selectin function are conserved in the putative protein. Whole-mount in situ hybridization of zebrafish at 24 and 48 h post-fertilization (hpf) revealed E-selectin expression mainly in vascular/endothelial progenitor cells in the posterior trunk and blood cells in the intermediate cell mass and posterior cardinal vein regions. Real-time quantitative RT-PCR analysis detected E-selectin expression at 0.2, 24 and 48 hpf and significantly decreased from 48 to 72 hpf. The expression of E-selectin, tumor necrosis factor-α and interleukin-1β was significantly upregulated at 22 to 72 h after induction with bacterial lipopolysaccharide. Thus, the structure of E-selectin protein is highly conserved among species, and E-selectin may be involved in embryonic development and essential for hematopoiesis and angiogenesis during embryonic development in zebrafish. Furthermore, we provide the first evidence of inflammatory mediators inducing E-selectin expression in non-mammalian vertebrates, which suggests that zebrafish E-selectin may be involved in inflammation and probably has similar biological function to mammalian E-selectin.

Monacolin K is one of the bioactive substances produced by Monascus ruber during fermentation. The multi-factors and their interactions on the effect of solid-state fermentation of Monascus for high yield of monacolin K were attractive to industrial production. A detailed study of 7 single-factor experiments and a series of experiments with Plackette-Burman and Box-Benhnken design, data fitting and modeling, and analyzing the visual 3D response surface plots for investigation of the key factors for Monacolin K production. The results showed that initial moisture (50 ~ 55%) and bran content (4.5 ~ 5.5%) as the key factors of transport for nutrients and oxygen during the solid-state fermentation (SSF) process of Monascus. Under the optimal conditions, a temperature shifting of the SSF with a higher Monacolin K yield of 14.53 ± 0.16 mg·g− 1 compared with the content of monacolin K in the commercially available functional red yeast rice of 8 mg g− 1.

No abstract