Planta Med 2008; 74 - PB123
DOI: 10.1055/s-0028-1084468

Prenylated xanthones and other constituents from the wood of Garcinia merguensis

A Kijjoa 1, M Pinto 2, 3, MJ Gonzalez 2, 3, MSJ Nascimento 3, 4, IO Mondranondra 5
  • 1Instituto de Ciências Biomédicas Abel Salazar and CIIMAR, Universidade do Porto, 4099–003 Porto, Portugal
  • 2Serviço de Química Orgânica, Faculdade de Farmácia da Universidade do Porto, Rua Aníbal Cunha 164, 4050–045 Porto, Portugal
  • 3CEQOFFUP/CEQUIMED, Universidade do Porto, Rua Aníbal Cunha 164, 4050–045 Porto, Portugal
  • 4Serviço de Microbiologia, Faculdade de Farmácia de Universidade do Porto, Rua Aníbal Cunha 164, 4050–045 Porto, Portugal
  • 5Department of Pharmaceutical Botany, Faculty of Pharmacy, Chulalongkorn University, Bangkok, Thailand

Garcinia merguensis Wight is a medium size tree found in Indo-China, Thailand, Mayanmar and Indonesia and its leaves are used in folk medicine for the treatment of oedemas [1]. Nguyen et al [2] have reported isolation of a new xanthone merguenone together with nine known xanthones from the bark of this plant, collected in Vietnam. In the course of our investigation on the bioactive secondary metabolites from the plants of the Clusaceae family, we have isolated α-mangostin, rubraxanthone and isocowanol as well as (2E, 6E, 10E)-4β -hydroxy-3-methyl-5β -(3,7,11,15-tetramethylhexadeca-2,6,10-tetraenyl)-cyclohex-2-en-1-one and 3,3',4-O-trimethylellagic acid from the wood of Garcinia merguensis collected in Southern Thailand. All the compounds were evaluated for their in vitro effect on the growth of four human tumour cell lines: MCF-7, MDA-MB-231, NCI-H460 and SF-268. Rubraxanthone was found to exhibit strong activity against all the cell lines with IC50 of 9.0µM against MCF-7. On the other hand, (2E, 6E, 10E)-4β -hydroxy-3-methyl-5β-(3,7,11,15-tetramethylhexadeca-2,6,10-tetraenyl)-cyclohex-2-en-1-one showed strong activity against MCF-7 (IC50=12.1µM) and moderate activity against other cell lines.

Acknowledgement: We thank FCT for support to CIIMAR Plurianual and CEQOFFUP/CEQUIMED and POCTI

References: 1. Smitinand, T. (1991) Thai Plnat Names. The Forest Herbarium, Royal Forest Department. Bangkok, Thailand.

2. Nguyen, LD. et al. (2003) Phytochemistry 63: 467–470.