Mechanism of anti-inflammatory activity of flavonoid mixture

2016 Fiscal Year Final Research Report

• Project/Area Number: 26460130
• Research Category: Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research (C)
• Allocation Type: Multi-year Fund
• Section: 一般
• Research Field: Natural medicines
• Research Institution: Keio University
• Principal Investigator: KIUCHI FUMIYUKI 慶應義塾大学, 薬学部(芝共立), 教授 (60161402)
• Research Collaborator: SHIMIZU Tomofumi ; YUJI Narukawa ; HADA Noriyasu
• Project Period (FY): 2014-04-01 – 2017-03-31
• Keywords: オウゴン / 抗炎症作用 / プロスタグランジン / フラボノイド / 混合物 / 相乗作用

Outline of Final Research Achievements

Three flavonoids contained in Scutellaria Root show synergistic effect on production of prostaglandin (PG) E2, a mediator of inflammation, in lipopolysaccharide-stimulated cells. In this study, the mechanism of this synergistic effect was investigated. Although the structures of the flavonoids are similar, they inhibited different processes leading to the production of PGE2: i. e. translocation of NF-κB to nucleus, NF-κB dependent transcription, and COX-2 enzyme activity. As the mixture of the flavonoids did not show synergistic effect on each step, the synergistic effect of the mixture is due to multi-step effects by different compounds in the LPS-initiated signal transduction processes. A crude drug contains many constituents. Although the amount of each constituent is not so large, the result obtained in this project indicates that synergistic effect of many constituents to different targets lead to the effectiveness of the crude drug.

Free Research Field

生薬学・天然物化学