The Medicinal Plant Pair Bupleurum chinense-Scutellaria baicalensis – Metabolomics and Metallomics Analysis in a Model for Alcoholic Liver Injury

Abstract

Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM), a complex natural herbal medicine system, has increasingly attracted attention from all over the world. Most research has illustrated the mechanism of TCM based on the active components or single herbs. It was fruitful and effective but far from satisfactory as it failed to gain insights into the interactivity and combined effects of TCM. In this work, we used Bupleurum chinense ( B. chinense DC, a species in the genus Bupleurum , family Apiaceae ) and Scutellaria baicalensis ( S. baicalensis Georgi, a species in the genus Scutellaria , family Lamiaceae ), an herbal pair in TCM, to illustrate the combined effect. We compared the diverse effects between the B. chinense-S. baicalensis herbal pair and its compositions in an animal model of Alcoholic Liver Injury to highlight the advantages of the formula. Biochemical and histological indicators revealed that the effect of B. chinense-S. baicalensis was better than its individual parts. Furthermore, metabolite profiling of the serum, liver tissue, and feces were conducted to reveal that the herbal pair largely presented its effects through enhanced tissue penetration to maintain liver-located intervention with less global and symbiotic disturbance. Furthermore, we analyzed the distribution of the metal elements in extracts of the serum and liver tissue and found that the herbal pair significantly regulated the distribution of endogenous selenium in liver tissue. As selenium plays an important role in the anti-oxidative and hepatoprotective effects, it may be the reason for combined effects in BS formula. This research could open new perspectives for exploring the material basis of combined effects in natural herbal medicine.

Wogonoside attenuates liver fibrosis by triggering hepatic stellate cell ferroptosis through SOCS1/P53/SLC7A11 pathway

“…Scutellaria baicalensis Georgi, a perennial herb of the Labiatae family, is widely used in Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) for liver diseases (Syafni et al, 2021). Modern pharmacological studies showed that S. baicalensis Georgi extract or active components can improve accumulation of hepatic injury (Dang et al, 2019; Zhao, Li, Gao, Gong, & Xu, 2006). Wogonoside (5,7‐dihydroxy‐8‐methoxyflavone‐7‐O‐β‐D‐glucuronide, WG), a bioactive flavonoid isolated from the root of S. baicalensis Georgi, possesses multiple pharmacological properties including anti‐cancer, anti‐inflammatory and anti‐fibrotic activity (Chen et al, 2019; Huang et al, 2020; Wang et al, 2015).…”

Baicalein Prevents Fructose-Induced Hepatic Steatosis in Rats: In the Regulation of Fatty Acid De Novo Synthesis, Fatty Acid Elongation and Fatty Acid Oxidation

“…Baicalein (BAL, NCBI CID: 5281605), a major flavonoid compound isolated from the roots of the Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) Scutellaria baicalensis Georgi (Labiatae), has been used to treat liver disease for thousands of years in TCM clinical practice ( Li-Weber, 2009 ; Dang et al, 2019 ). Previous studies indicated that BAL can protect the liver from high-fat diet (HFD)-induced hepatic steatosis, lipopolysaccharides (LPS)/ d -galactosamine (D-gal) and high-cholesterol diet (HCD)-induced liver injury by maintaining V-ATPase assembly, antioxidant stress and anti-inflammatory effect, respectively ( Alsaad et al, 2020 ; Zhu et al, 2020 ; Xiao et al, 2021 ).…”

The Structural Characteristics of an Acidic Water-Soluble Polysaccharide from Bupleurum chinense DC and Its In Vivo Anti-Tumor Activity on H22 Tumor-Bearing Mice

“…In order to further characterize the BCP structure, we performed an NMR analysis. The glycosidic bond with anomeric hydrogen on α-type generated chemical shifts at δ 4.9–5.9 ppm, while β-type caused shift at δ 4.3–4.9 ppm [ 48 , 49 , 50 ]. As shown in Figure 7 A, the chemical shift of 1 H NMR spectra of δ 3.25–5.30 ppm confirmed BCP as a typical polysaccharide with both α-type glycosidic bond and β-type glycosidic bond [ 51 ].…”