ANTIINFLAMMATORY PRINCIPLES OFCAESALPINIA SAPPANWOOD AND OFHAEMATOXYLON CAMPECHIANUMWOOD¹

Abstract

C a e s a l p i n i a s a p p a n wood has been evaluated for its antiinflammatory effects based on its traditional usage in Oriental medicine to reveal that it is active in the fertile egg assay. Then, its extract has been fractionated monitored by the physiological activity, resulting in the isolation of brazilin as the actiue principle. Brazilin, together with hematoxylin a constituent o f H a e m a t o x y 1 o n c a mp e c h i a n u m wood, have been subjected to various antiinflammatory assays. Both the substances have proved to exhibit significant antiinflammatory actiuities in the carrageenin-induced rat paw edema test and the fertile egg test: the order o f activity was brazilin > hematoxylin, and in the former test bmzilin at 20 mg/ kg P.O. was more effective than berberine chloride at 100 mglkg p.0. Brazilin has also been shown t o be approximately as active as berberine chloride in the granuloma pellet assay in rats. These properties of brazilin support its clinical application of the crude drug sappan wood in certain inflammatory disorders.

Antinociceptive and anti-inflammatory effects of Caesalpinia pyramidalis in rodents

“…Previous studies of species of the genus Caesalpinia, Fabaceae, report remarkable biological activities, such as antimicrobial (Saeed & Sabir, 2001), antidiabetic (Sharma et al, 1997) (C. bonducella), antimalarial (Deharo et al, 2001;Kuria et al, 2001) (C. volkensii, C. pluviosa), and anti-infl ammatory (Hikino et al, 1977;Carvalho et al, 1996) (C. sappan, C. ferrea) activities.…”

Antioxidant Activity of Caesalpinia sappan Heartwood

“…anticomplementary, 5) modulation of immune function, 6) hepatoprotective, 7) antiinflammatory, 8) cytotoxic, 9) hypoglycemic 10) and several other biological activities have been reported. 1) Several triterpenoids, 11) flavonoids, 12,13) phenolics, 12,14,15) steroids 11) have been isolated from the heartwood.…”

Antiplatelet activity of BRX-018, (6aS,cis)-Malonic acid 3-acetoxy-6a9-bis-(2-methoxycarbonyl-acetoxy)-6,6a,7,11b-tetrahydro-indeno[2,1-c]chromen-10-yl ester methylester

“…Brazilin is the major constituent of C. sappan. It was previously reported that brazilin (7,11b-dihydrobenz[b]indeno [1,2-d]pyran-3,6a,9,10(6H)-tetrol), the major component of C. sappan [16], showed antiplatelet activity through the inhibitory effects on PLA 2 activity and the increase in intracellular free Ca 2+ concentration ([Ca 2+ ] i ; [17]). These results suggest that brazilin could be a new lead compound in the development of antiplatelet agents.…”