Medicinal plants of the Dendrobium genus are highly prized, and hence, methodologies have been developed to authenticate Dendrobium drugs from its adulterants. Many bioactive constituents of Dendrobium species have been identified. The macromolecules included lectins; the enzymes chalcone synthase, sucrose synthase, and cytokinin oxidase; and polysaccharides. The polysaccharides display immunomodulatory and hepatoprotective activities. Alkaloids exhibit antioxidant, anticancer, and neuroprotective activities. Other compounds manifest antioxidant, anticancer, and immunomodulatory.

Review of research on Dendrobium, a prized folk medicine.

The fresh or dried stems of many Dendrobium species are well known as one of the most expensive tonics in traditional Chinese medicine Documented as a “superior grade” herbal medicine in the ancient text “Shen Nong’s Herbal Classic”, Dendrobium has been used for thousands of years and is now a popular health food worldwide The main chemical components of Dendrobium are alkaloids, aromatic compounds, sesquiterpenoids and polysaccharides, with multiple biological activities, including immunomodulatory, neuroprotective and anti-tumor effects, etc Various qualitative and quantitative methods have been developed for the quality evaluation of Dendrobium In this review, the research progress since the 1930s relating to the chemistry, bioactivity and quality control of Dendrobium is summarized, existing problems and prospects are also discussed

Chemistry, bioactivity and quality control of Dendrobium, a commonly used tonic herb in traditional Chinese medicine

Although phenanthrenes are considered to constitute a relatively small group of natural products, discovering new phenanthrene derivatives and evaluating their prospective biological activities have become of great interest to many research groups worldwide. Based on 160 references, this review covers the phytochemistry and pharmacology of 213 naturally occurring phenanthrenes that have been isolated between 2008 and 2016. More than 40% of the 450 currently known naturally occurring phenanthrenes were identified during this period. The family Orchidaceae is the most abundant source of these compounds, although several new plant families and genera have been involved in the search for phenanthrenes. The presence of certain substituent patterns may be restricted to specific families; vinyl-substituted phenanthrenes were reported only from Juncaceae plants, and prenylated derivatives occur mainly in Euphorbiaceae species. Therefore, these compounds also can serve as chemotaxonomic markers. Almost all of the ...

Phenanthrenes: A Promising Group of Plant Secondary Metabolites

Chromatographic separation of a methanol extract prepared from the whole plant of Dendrobium brymerianum led to the isolation of eight phenolic compounds. Among the isolated compounds (1–8), moscatilin (1), gigantol (3), lusianthridin (4), and dendroflorin (6) showed appreciable cytotoxicity against human lung cancer cell lines with IC50 values of 196.7, 23.4, 65.0, and 125.8 μg/mL, respectively, and exhibited antimigratory property at nontoxic concentrations. This study is the first report on the biological activities of this plant.

https://downloads.hindawi.com/journals/ecam/2015/350410.pdf

Cytotoxic and Antimigratory Activities of Phenolic Compounds from Dendrobium brymerianum

Dendrobium officinale is a precious medicinal herb and health food, and its pharmacological actions have been studied and proved. However, the mechanisms by which its active flavonoid glycosides affect epithelial⁻mesenchymal transition (EMT) in hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) cells, such as HepG2 and Bel-7402 cells, have not been previously investigated. Therefore, we investigated whether isoviolanthin extracted from the leaves of Dendrobium officinale inhibits transforming growth factor (TGF)-β1-induced EMT in HCC cells. In this study, the physicochemical properties and structure of isoviolanthin were identified by HPLC, UV, ESIMS, and NMR and were compared with literature data. HCC cells were pretreated with 10 ng/mL TGF-β1 to induce EMT and then treated with isoviolanthin. Herein, we found that isoviolanthin exhibited no cytotoxic effects on normal liver LO2 cells but notably reduced the migratory and invasive capacities of TGF-β1-treated HCC cells. Additionally, isoviolanthin treatment decreased matrix metalloproteinase (MMP)-2 and -9 levels, and remarkably altered the expression of EMT markers via regulating the TGF-β/Smad and PI3K/Akt/mTOR signaling pathways; Western blot analysis confirmed that the effects of the inhibitors SB431542 and LY294002 were consistent with those of isoviolanthin. These findings demonstrate the potential of isoviolanthin as a therapeutic agent for the treatment of advanced-stage metastatic HCC.

https://www.mdpi.com/1422-0067/19/6/1556/pdf

Isoviolanthin Extracted from Dendrobium officinale Reverses TGF-β1-Mediated Epithelial⁻Mesenchymal Transition in Hepatocellular Carcinoma Cells via Deactivating the TGF-β/Smad and PI3K/Akt/mTOR Signaling Pathways.

Five new compounds from Dendrobium crystallinum

Two new bibenzyl derivatives, named dengraols A 1 and B 2, are isolated from stems of Dendrobium gratiosissimum Rchb. (Orchidaceae), together with seven known compounds: 3,5,4'-trihydroxybibenzyl 3, 3,4'-dihydroxy- 5-methoxybibenzyl 4, 3, 4 -dihydroxy-5, 4' - dimethoxy bibenzyl 5, 3, 4' - dihydroxy - 4, 5, 3'-trimethoxybibenzyl (moscatilin) 6 and 5, 4'- dihydroxy -3, 3'-dimethoxybibenzyl (gigantol) 7, 5, 3', 4'-trihydroxy - 3- methoxy-bibenzyl (tristin) 8 and 5, 3'- dihydroxy- 3-methoxybibenzyl (batatasin III) 9. Among the isolated compounds, dengraols A 1 and B 2, moscatilin 6 and gigantol 7 showed inhibitory activity of proliferation on HL-60 cells with IC 50 values at 2.1, 6.4, 0.082 and 10.6 (μM, respectively.

Chemical Constituents of Dendrobium gratiosissimum and Their Cytotoxic Activities.

OBJECTIVE To study the phenolic constituents of Dendrobium aphyllum. METHOD Various chromatographic techniques were used to isolate and purify the constituents, their physico-chemical properties and spectral data were employed to elucidate their structures. RESULT Nine bibenzyls and two benzylethanyl compounds were isolated and identified as: moscatilin (1), gigantol (2), batatasin (3), tristin (4), 3, 5, 4'-trihydroxylbibenzyl (5), 3, 5-dimethoxyl-4, 4'-dihydroxylbibenzyl (6), moscatin (7), 2, 4, 7-trihydroxyl-9, 10-dihydrophenanthrene (8), hircinol (9), 2-(4-hydroxyphenyl) ethyl-beta-D-glucopyranoside, salidroside (10) and p-hydroxylbenzylacetic acid (11). CONCLUSION All compounds were obtained firstly from the plant, and the compounds 10 and 11 were isolated in this genus for the first time.

Phenolic components from herbs of Dendrobium aphyllum

/pdf/chemical-constituents-of-dendrobium-gratiosissimum-and-their-6zfuw2r45d.pdf

Luo-Shan Xu

Papers

Five new compounds from Dendrobium crystallinum

Chemical Constituents of Dendrobium gratiosissimum and Their Cytotoxic Activities.

Phenolic components from herbs of Dendrobium aphyllum

Chemical constituents of Dendrobium gratiosissimum and their cytotoxic activities