(±)-Decumicorine A (
1
) and (±)-
epi
-decumicorine A (
2
), two pairs of enantiomeric isoquinoline alkaloids featuring a novel phenylpropanoid-conjugated protoberberine skeleton, were isolated and purified from the rhizomes of
Corydalis decumbens
. The separation of (±)-
1
and (±)-
2
was achieved by chiral HPLC to produce four optically pure enantiomers. The structures and absolute configurations of compounds (−)-
1
, (+)-
1
, (−)-
2
, and (+)-
2
were elucidated by spectroscopic analysis, ECD calculations, and X-ray crystallographic analyses. The two racemates were generated from a Diels-Alder [4 + 2] cycloaddition between jatrorrhizine and ferulic acid in the proposed biosynthetic pathways, which were fully verified by a biomimetic synthesis. Moreover, compound (+)-
1
exhibited an antiviral entry effect on SARS-CoV-2 pseudovirus by blocking spike binding to the ACE2 receptor on HEK-293T-ACE2
h
host cells.
Supplementary Information
The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1007/s12272-022-01401-6.