Treatment of osteoarthritis by salvianolic acid derivatives.

Abstract

Osteoarthritis (OA) is a pervasive degenerative joint disorder. Approximately 32.5 million US adults are suffering from this disease. The joint disease is characterized by oxidative stress, synovial fluid inflammation, apoptosis in chondrocytes, cartilage degradation, bone sclerosis, and osteophyte formation. Reactive oxygen species (ROS) production due to oxidative stress is the primary cause of many pathological disease processes. The understanding of molecular and cellular pathways and their association with joint tissues is necessary to develop new therapeutic approaches for the prevention and treatment of OA. Most over-the-counter non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs are used to treat OA. Natural compounds with medicinal properties are useful and effective sources for the treatment of various diseases since ancient times. Salvianolic acid is one of the natural phenolic compounds of the plant Radix Salvia miltiorrhiza having antioxidant, anti-inflammatory, antimicrobial, anesthetic, and cytotoxic properties. There is a critical need for new drug planning to focus on the specific mechanisms of oxidative interaction in targeted TRPA1 ion channels and intracellular ion signaling, which will interact with other TRP channel subunits to regulate pathological diseases. In our experiment, we found that the rise of intracellular calcium ions in rat osteoblast cells due to excessive free radicals generated by H2O2 was suppressed by Salvianolic Acid-B. Therefore, this pilot project aims to identify Salvianolic acid analogs as lead compounds that target the TRP channel which is one of the key pathway players in producing arthritis pain and other pathogenesis.