• Advances in Traditional Medicine
• /
• v.7 no.4
• /
• pp.336-340
• /
• 2007

Plants from the genus Centaurea (C.) (Family: Asteraceae alt. Compositae), widely distributed in Asia, Europe and North America, have traditionally been used in the treatment of various ailments. As a part of our on-going studies on the plants from the genus C. for their phytochemistry and biological activities, extracts of the seeds of Turkish endemic C. species, C. bornmuelleri and C. huber-morathii, were tested for their cytotoxicity towards the CaCo2 colon cancer cell line as well as for the toxicity towards the brine shrimps, using the MTT and the brine shrimp lethality assays, respectively. Among the extracts, the MeOH extract of these plants showed significant toxicity towards the brine shrimps ($LD_{50}=55.2{\times}10^{-2}\;and\;42.4{\times}10^{-2}mg/ml$, respectively). The MeOH extract of both C. species also inhibited the growth of CaCo2 colon cancer cells in the MTT assay ($IC_{50}$=29.9 and 33.0 g/ml, respectively). As the most prominent activities in both assays were observed with the MeOH extracts, it can be assumed that the compound(s) responsible for these activities are polar in nature.

• Journal of Species Research
• /
• v.10 no.2
• /
• pp.159-163
• /
• 2021

Saussurea albifolia, a new species, is reported from the Baekdudaegan Mountains. It has distinctive morphological characteristics that distinguish it from other congeneric species of Saussurea in Korea; radical leaves persist or withered till flowering, white tomentose leaf beneath, campanulate involucre with brown-cobwebby hairs, and dark purplish phyllaries with acuminate tips. Saussurea albifolia is a new, endemic species, narrowly restricted to the Korean Peninsula as a consequence of adaptation to alpine or subalpine environments of the Baekdudaegan Area. Among the Korean species of Saussurea, S. gracilis Maxim., S. insularis Kitam., and S. seoulensis Nakai are morphologically similar to S. albifolia by having leaves with white hairs beneath and persistent radical leaves during blooming period. It has been well understood that Saussurea is one of the highly diversified and adaptable groups in Asteraceae and also that the currently recognized species in Korea likely significant underestimates its diversity on the Korean Peninsula.

• Archives of Pharmacal Research
• /
• v.27 no.10
• /
• pp.1037-1042
• /
• 2004

Study of the effects of the methanolic extract of Tagetes patula roots on blood pressure led to the isolation of well known citric (1) and malic acid (7) as hypotensive, and pyridine hydrochloride (4) as hypertensive constituents of the plant along with a new constituent, 2-hydroxy, 5- hydroxymethyl furan (9). Citric acid and malic acid caused 71% and 43% fall in Mean Arterial Blood Pressure (MABP) of rats at the doses of 15 mg/kg and 30mg/kg respectively while pyridine hydrochloride produced 34% rise in the MABP of rats at the dose of 30mg/kg. $LD_{50}\;and\;LD_{100}$ of citric acid in mice have been determined as 545 mg/kg and 1000 mg/kg, respectively.

• Journal of Species Research
• /
• v.6 no.1
• /
• pp.76-90
• /
• 2017

Aster altaicus var. uchiyamae Kitam. is an endemic taxon of Korea and is protected by law as an endanger taxon. The genetic information of A. altaicus var. uchiyamae is unavailable in Genbank. Here we sequenced chloroplast genome of A. altaicus var. uchiyamae. The cp-genome of Aster altaicus var. uchiyamae was 152,446 bps in size: LSC was 84,240 bps, IR 25,005 bps, SSC 18,196 bps. The cp-genome contains 112 genes and 21 introns consisted of 79 protein coding genes(PCGs), 4 RNA genes, and 29 tRNA genes, with 20 group II introns and one group I intron. There were three pseudo-genes including ${\psi}$-ycf1, ${\psi}$-rps19, and ${\psi}$-trnT_GGU. Eighteen genes, five introns, and parts of two genes and an intron are found within the IR, which has two copies. The cp-DNA of Aster altaicus var. uchiyamae is distinguished from A. spathulifolius, only known cp-genome of the genus Aster, by 172 SNP in genic regions of 43 PCGs and 21 indels in 11 PCGs and SSU. The chloroplast genome sequence was deposited at GenBank (KX35265).

• Korean Journal of Pharmacognosy
• /
• v.49 no.2
• /
• pp.165-171
• /
• 2018

Artemisiae Capillaris Herba is a dried aerial part of Asteraceae capillaris Thunb.(Compositae), which has been used in Korean traditional medicine for the treatment of various diseases. It has a variety of pharmacological activities and has been evaluated for potential as an active ingredient in cosmeceutical products. In the cosmetics industry, animal experiments is besides the major concern of ethics, there are few more disadvantages of animal experimentation like demand of skilled manpower, time consuming protocols and high cost. Therefore, various alternatives to animal experiments have been proposed. The purpose of this study was to investigate the skin permeation characteristics of chlorogenic acid and dimethyleculetin, which are constituent of Artemisiae Capillaris Herba by using Franz diffusion cell. As a result, skin permeability was characterized by flux(penetration rates) and $K_p$(permeability coefficient) value, chlorogenic acid had lower flux and $K_p$ than dimethylesculetin. According to the definitions of Marzulli, chlorogenic acid and dimethylesculetin would be classified as 'Moderate' and 'Very fast' respectively. In conclusion, skin permeation characteristics of chlorogenic acid and dimethylesculetin were confirmed through Franz diffusion cell, and suggests the direction of alternative method for skin permeation of natural compounds.

• FLOWER RESEARCH JOURNAL
• /
• v.17 no.4
• /
• pp.271-278
• /
• 2009

The attempts to develop natural antioxidants have been made with aerial part of 16 Compositae species by analyzing their phenolic compound contents, scavenging activities on 1,l-diphenyl-2-picrylhydrazyl (DPPH) and 2,2'-azino-bis-(3-ethylbenzthiazoline-6-sulphonic acid) (ABTS) radicals, ferrous ion chelating effects and inhibition effects on peroxidation of linoleic acids. Total polyphenol and flavonoid contents were highest in Matricaria recutica. Scavenging activity on DPPH and ABTS radicals were highest with extracts of Echinacea angustifolia and Serratula coronata var. insularis f. insularis, respectively. Aerial palt extracts of all species showed lower DPPH scavenging activity than ascorbic acid and 2,6-Di-tert-butyl-4-methylphenol (BHT). But Serratula coronata var. insularis f. insularis demonstrated higher ABTS scavenging activity than ascorbic acid and BHT. In Hieracium pilosella, Echinacea angustifolia, Matricaria reculica extracts showed higher ABTS scavenging activity than BHT. Ferrous ion chelating effects was highest with Matricaria recutica extract, but the effects were much lower than ethylenediaminetetraacetic acid (EDTA). The inhibition activity in lipid peroxidation of linoleic acids was highest in Eupatorium japonicum with 90.06% inhibition 4 days after reaction and 40.52% after 24 days. This demonstrated higher inhibition activity and longer lasting than BHT. Aerial part of Matricaria recutica for extraction source, rather than flower, has higher potential for antiox.idant material. In conclusion, development of natural antioxidants in Compositae is possible by studying antioxidant activity of each species.

• Korean Journal of Plant Taxonomy
• /
• v.44 no.1
• /
• pp.13-17
• /
• 2014

Two naturalized plants belonging to Asteraceae (Compositae) were collected in Gangwon-do and Jeju-do. Euthamia graminifolia (L.) Nutt., a taxon of unrecorded genus Euthamia Nutt., was found in Inje-gun, Gangwon-do. This species can be distinguished from Solidago japonica Kitam. and S. gigantea Aiton by punctate, entire leaves and disc corollas without vein. Its Korean name was given 'Mi-yeok-chwi-a-jae-bi' because it shows similar external appearances with that of the Mi-yeok-chwi (Solidago japonica Kitam.). Gamochaeta pensylvanica (Willd.) Cabrera was discovered in Jeju-do. It can be distinguished from G. purpurea (L.) Cabrera by withering basal leaves at flowering and relatively short inner phyllaries. This taxon was named 'Mi-guk-pulsom- na-mul' in Korean by considering its specific epithet.

• Journal of Species Research
• /
• v.4 no.2
• /
• pp.152-158
• /
• 2015

Dendranthema boreale and D. indicum are easily distinguished from other Korean Dendranthema spp. by having yellow flowers. We have found a putative new taxon of Dendranthema having white flowers, except for sharing most characters with Dendranthema boreale. The chloroplast (cp) genome of the putative new taxon of Dendranthema, Dendranthema sp. K247003, registered in National Agro-Biodiversity Center (ABC), was completely characterized as a genetic barcode. The cp-genome of Dendranthema sp. K247003 was 151,175-bp in size: LSC was 82,886-bp, IR 24,971-bp, SSC 18,347-bp. The cp-genome of Dendranthema sp. K247003 contains 113 genes and 21 introns consisted of 79 protein coding genes, 4 RNA genes, and 30 tRNA genes, with 20 group II introns and one group I intron. Some of the genes and there introns were duplicated in IR. The cp-DNA of Dendranthema sp. K247003 is distinguished from that of D. boreale IT121002 by 67 SNPs in genic regions of 24 protein coding genes and by a 9-bp INDEL in ycf1. Further cp-DNA study will give us better information on genetic markers of Dendranthema species.

• Genomics & Informatics
• /
• v.16 no.4
• /
• pp.34.1-34.9
• /
• 2018

Cirsium japonicum belongs to the Asteraceae or Compositae family and is a medicinal plant in Asia that has a variety of effects, including tumour inhibition, improved immunity with flavones, and antidiabetic and hepatoprotective effects. Silymarin is synthesized by 4-coumaroyl-CoA via both the flavonoid and phenylpropanoid pathways to produce the immediate precursors taxifolin and coniferyl alcohol. Then, the oxidative radicalization of taxifolin and coniferyl alcohol produces silymarin. We identified the expression of genes related to the synthesis of silymarin in C. japonicum in three different tissues, namely, flowers, leaves, and roots, through RNA sequencing. We obtained 51,133 unigenes from transcriptome sequencing by de novo assembly using Trinity v2.1.1, TransDecoder v2.0.1, and CD-HIT v4.6 software. The differentially expressed gene analysis revealed that the expression of genes related to the flavonoid pathway was higher in the flowers, whereas the phenylpropanoid pathway was more highly expressed in the roots. In this study, we established a global transcriptome dataset for C. japonicum. The data shall not only be useful to focus more deeply on the genes related to product medicinal metabolite including flavolignan but also to study the functional genomics for genetic engineering of C. japonicum.

• Korean Journal of Plant Taxonomy
• /
• v.52 no.2
• /
• pp.97-101
• /
• 2022

Saussurea namhaedoana, a new endemic species narrowly restricted to Namhaedo Island of Korea, is reported in this study. It can be distinguished from other congeneric species of Saussurea in Korea by having persistent radical leaves until flowering, hastate or sagittate leaves with mucronate toothed to undulate-lobulate margins, grayish cobwebby hairs on abaxial leaf surfaces when young, and tubular involucre with grayish cobwebby hairs. Morphologically, S. namhaedoana is closely related to other species in Korea, such as S. gracilis Maxim., S. insularis Kitam., S. seoulensis Nakai and S. albifolia M. J. Nam and H. T. Im, sharing grayish or white hairs on the abaxial leaf surfaces. It, however, can be distinguished from its close relatives by having a distinct leaf shape, i.e., sagittate or hastate leaves. The phylogenetic relationship relative to congeners in East Asia is yet to be determined.