Series of polycyclic polyprenylated acylphloroglucinols (PPAPs) have been isolated from the plants of Clusiaceae family, of which possess various biological activity.Hypericum sampsonii belongs to the Hypericum genus of Guttiferae family with abundant complex caged PPAPs, which exhibits anticancer activity, and has been used as a promising anticancer herb in Taiwan. In our efforts for more novel PPAPs, four new decarbonyl PPAPs norsampsones A-D(1 – 4), together with hypersampsone M (5), were isolated from the 60% EtOH extract of the aerial parts of H. sampsonii. Norsampsones A-D featured an unprecedented carbon skeleton with the loss of a carbonyl in phloroglucinol ring. All structures were determined by extensive NMR spectroscopic methods, ECD calculation, and single-crystal X-ray diffraction.Generally, most of the discovered PPAPs isolated from H. sampsonii form a unique family of structurally related caged metabolites, which were probably biosynthesized from a common precursor i. The plausible biosynthetic pathway to 1 – 5 was proposed. Norsampsones A-D (1 – 4) could be considered as the PPAPs with the loss of C-2 carbonyl in phloroglucinol ring. The plausible biogenetic pathway of 1 – 4 was also proposed to be generated from i through the Retro-Claisen and decarboxylation reaction. Hypersampsone M (5) was probably biosynthesized from the same precursor i by epoxidation, followed by intramolecular cyclization, oxidation, dehydration and reduction reaction.In addition, compounds 1, 3 and 4 were investigated for their effects on RXRα transcriptional-inhibitory activities using a reporter gene assay. Besides, their cytotoxicity against Hela cell were also evaluated. Compound 3 showed mild RXRα transcrip-tional-inhibitory activities as well as apopototic effects against Hela cell in a dose dependent manner.
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