M. Ettlinger

Bio: M. Ettlinger is an academic researcher from University of Copenhagen. The author has contributed to research in topics: Glucosidases & Glucal. The author has an hindex of 1, co-authored 1 publications receiving 185 citations.

α-glucosidase inhibitors from plants: A natural approach to treat diabetes.

Abstract: Diabetes is a common metabolic disease characterized by abnormally high plasma glucose levels, leading to major complications, such as diabetic neuropathy, retinopathy, and cardiovascular diseases. One of the effective managements of diabetes mellitus, in particular, non-insulin-dependent diabetes mellitus (NIDDM) to decrease postprandial hyperglycemia, is to retard the absorption of glucose by inhibition of carbohydrate hydrolyzing enzymes, such as α-glucosidase and α-amylase, in the digestive organs. α-Glucosidase is the key enzyme catalyzing the final step in the digestive process of carbohydrates. Hence, α-glucosidase inhibitors can retard the liberation of d-glucose from dietary complex carbohydrates and delay glucose absorption, resulting in reduced postprandial plasma glucose levels and suppression of postprandial hyperglycemia. In recent years, many efforts have been made to identify effective α-glucosidase inhibitors from natural sources in order to develop a physiologic functional food or lead compounds for use against diabetes. Many α-glucosidase inhibitors that are phytoconstituents, such as flavonoids, alkaloids, terpenoids,anthocyanins, glycosides, phenolic compounds, and so on, have been isolated from plants. In the present review, we focus on the constituents isolated from different plants having α-glucosidase inhibitory potency along with IC50 values.

Glycoside Hydrolases: Mechanistic Information from Studies with Reversible and Irreversible Inhibitors

Abstract: Publisher Summary This chapter discusses the results of the studies that permit some generalizations on the catalytic mechanism of glycoside hydrolases from widely differing sources and with different sugar and aglycon specificities and that have become available over the past 15 years. The strong inhibition of glycosidases by aldonolactones was first mentioned in 1940 by Japanese workers who studied β- D -glucosidases from Aspergillus (Taka-diastase) and almonds. Even though both of these groups of compounds are derived from normal substrates by only a minor modification of the glycon moiety, they are discussed together with pseudosubstrates because their reactions with glycosidases show, in many cases, unusual kinetic features. The information relevant to the mechanism of an enzyme-catalyzed reaction can, in general, only be obtained from irreversible inhibitors that react specifically at the active site, and thereby inactivate the enzyme. In many cases, inhibition studies were not carried out to obtain information on the reaction mechanism, but for other purposes. Thus, only inhibitors were tested that were considered suitable for the particular project, for example, studies on the biological function of the enzyme where glycosylamines and aldonolactones are unsuitable.