arbutin and Asthma

Gerberae Piloselloidis Herba (GPH), a commonly used traditional medicine in China, is derived from Gerbera piloselloides (Linn.) Cass. It is featured by its special bioactivities as antitussive, expectorant, anti-asthma, anti-bacterial, anti-tumor, uterine analgesia, and immunity-enhancing. With a long history of medication in ethnic minority areas in China, it is often used as an effective treatment for cough and sore throat as well as allergic asthma. Although our previous investigation also has discovered GPH performed effective treatment on allergic asthma, its underlying mechanism remains unclear.. This research aims to reveal the pharmacological mechanism of GPH in the treatment for allergic asthma through combination of plasma pharmacology and network pharmacology.. Firstly, the components of GPH in blood samples were identified using UHPLC- Q-Orbitrap HRMS. An interaction network of "compound-target-disease" was constructed based on the compounds confirmed in blood and on their corresponding targets of allergic asthma acquired from disease gene databases, predicting the possible biological targets and potential signal pathways of GPH with the network pharmacology analysis. Then, a molecular docking between the blood ingredients and the core targets was carried out using the Autodock Vina software. Subsequently, after establishing a mouse model with allergic asthma induced by ovalbumin (OVA), the effect of GPH on allergic asthma was evaluated by analyzing a series of indicators including behavior, lung pathological changes, inflammatory factors in serum and bronchoalveolar lavage fluid (BALF). Finally, the key pathway and targets predicted by network pharmacology and molecular docking were further verified using Western blot analysis.. Eleven chemical constituents (such as arbutin, neochlorogenic acid, chlorogenic acid, etc.) were identified through the analysis of plasma samples, on which basis a total of 142 genes intersecting GPH and allergic asthma were collected by network pharmacology. After performing enrichment analysis of these genes in gene ontology (GO) and kyoto encyclopedia of genes and genomes (KEGG), it was found that arbutin-related targets mainly focused on phosphatidylinositol 3 kinase (PI3K)/protein kinase B (Akt) signal pathway, while luteolin and marmesin -related targets tended to locate at Interleukin-17 (IL-17) signal pathway. Meanwhile, the findings of molecular docking suggested that such components as arbutin, luteolin and marmesin entering into blood had good binding with the core targets related to PI3K/Akt and IL-17 pathways. In addition, GPH improved the OVA-induced asthma symptoms, the alveolar septa thickening and the infiltration of inflammatory cell around bronchi and bronchioles as well as reduced the levels of IgE, IL-8 and TNF-α in serum or BALF. Furthermore, GPH could inhibit the phosphorylation level of Akt and the expression of PI3K, an efficacy supported by the findings by way of Western blot which suggests that GPH in the treatment of allergic asthma was linked to PI3K/Akt signal pathway.. In this study, a comprehensive strategy to combine the UPLC-Q-Orbitrap HRMS with network pharmacology was employed to clarify the mechanism of GPH against allergic asthma, a finding where GPH may inhibit PI3K/Akt signal pathway to protect mice from OVA-induced allergic asthma. This study provides a deeper understanding of the pharmacological mechanism of GPH in treatment of asthma, offering a scientific reference for further research and clinical application of GPH in terms of allergic asthma.

Topics: Animals; Arbutin; Asthma; Drugs, Chinese Herbal; Ethnicity; Humans; Interleukin-17; Luteolin; Mice; Minority Groups; Molecular Docking Simulation; Network Pharmacology; Ovalbumin; Phosphatidylinositol 3-Kinases; Proto-Oncogene Proteins c-akt

Gerberae Piloselloidis Herba, a traditional Chinese medicine, is often employed to treat such lung-related diseases as coughs, asthma, and pulmonary carbuncles in southwest China. Our previous study demonstrated that its active fraction, prepared from Gerberae Piloselloidis Herba, exerts an obvious beneficial effect on asthma. However, the pharmacokinetics of its major constituents remain unclear. Therefore, an ultra-performance mass spectrometry-electrospray ionization-tandem mass spectrometry method was successfully established to simultaneously perform the pharmacokinetics of the main 11 components of the active fraction between normal and ovalbumin-induced asthmatic mice. Compared to the normal group, in asthmatic mice the peak concentration of arbutin, marmesin, caffeoylquinic acids, and flavonoid glycosides clearly increased, while for luteolin it significantly declined; the area under the curve for arbutin and luteolin showed an increase, but the values of marmesin, caffeoylquinic acids, and flavonoid glycosides revealed a decline; the peak time for arbutin, caffeoylquinic acids and flavonoid glycosides decreased, while for marmesin and luteolin it significantly augmented; apart from marmesin, the half-life for all compounds shortened significantly. It is indicated that the pathology of asthma could lead to an alteration in the pharmacokinetic profiles of the 11 components in plasma, providing a reference for further exploration of the pharmacodynamic basis of the anti-bronchial effect of Gerberae Piloselloidis Herba.

Topics: Administration, Oral; Animals; Arbutin; Asthma; Chromatography, High Pressure Liquid; Drugs, Chinese Herbal; Flavonoids; Glycosides; Luteolin; Mice