Project description:Stellaria dichotoma var. lanceolata (SdLv), a member of the Caryophyllaceae, is a traditional herbal medicine that has been used to treat fever, night sweats, and malaria in East Asia. Inflammation plays an essential role in both host defense and pathogenesis during infection by diverse intracellular pathogens. Herein, we showed that an herbal extract from SdLv effectively attenuated inflammatory responses from infection of Mycobacterium abscessus (Mab), but not Toxoplasma gondii (T. gondii). In primary murine macrophages, Mab infection resulted in the rapid activation of nuclear factor (NF)-?B and mitogen-activated protein kinase (MAPK), as well as in the generation of proinflammatory cytokines, such as tumor necrosis factor ? and interleukin-6, which were all significantly inhibited by pretreatment with SdLv. However, herbal extracts from Bupleurum chinense DC. (Buch) or Bupleurum falcatum L. (Bufa) did not affect M. abs-induced activation of proinflammatory responses. Importantly, we demonstrated that generation of intracellular reactive oxygen species, which are important signaling intermediaries in the activation of NF-?B and the MAPK signaling pathway, was rapidly increased in Mab-infected macrophages, and this was effectively suppressed by pretreatment with SdLv, but not Buch and Bufa. We further found that the treatment of Buch and Bufa, but not SdLv, led to the activation of NF-?B and the MAPK signaling pathway and the generation of intracellular reactive oxygen species. Moreover, oral administration of SdLv significantly reduced lethality in Mab-infected mice. Collectively, these results suggest the possible use of SdLv as an effective treatment for Mab infection.
Project description:Stellaria dichotoma var. lanceolata Bunge. is a traditional Chinese medicinal plant of Caryophyllaceae, which contains many chemicals, such as β-carboline alkaloids, sterols, cyclic peptides, phenolic acids, and flavonoids and so on, which was used as folk medicines for antifebrile to treat fever and to inhibit the cell growth, cyclooxygenase, and also can anti-inflammatory, anti-allergic, vasodilator, and other effects. Illumina paired-end reads data were used to assemble the complete chloroplast (cp) genome. 16,898,032 raw paired-end reads and the length distribution in 150,602 bp, including a large single-copy (LSC) region of 81,844 bp, a small single-copy (SSC) region of 17,022 bp and a pair of inverted repeats (IRs) of 25,868 bp. Besides, nine protein-coding genes (PCGs) genes and six tRNA genes possess a single intron, while clpP and ycf3 have a couple of introns. Based on the concatenated coding sequences of cp PCGs, the phylogenetic analysis showed that S. dichotoma and Pseudostellaria palibiniana (MK309611) are closely related to each other within the family Caryophyllaceae.
