Chemical Composition and Anti‐Inflammatory Activity of Selaginella tamariscina
Haimin Kuai, Xiaowei Wu, Yulin Feng, Jingyi Lai, Wenai Xu, Rong Wang, Hao WangABSTRACT
Selaginella tamariscina is a traditional Chinese medicine with promising anti‐inflammatory activity. In this study, a bioactivity‐guided strategy was employed to characterize its active constituents. The ethyl acetate fraction significantly reduced LPS‐induced nitric oxide production in RAW264.7 macrophages at 100 µg/mL. UPLC‐QTOF/MS analysis tentatively identified seven biflavonoids, including amentoflavone ( 1 ), 2,3‐dihydroamentoflavone ( 2 ), robustaflavone ( 3 ), 7″‐methoxyrobustaflavone ( 4 ), hinokiflavone ( 5 ), isocryptomerin ( 6 ), and neocryptomerin ( 7 ). Among them, five compounds exhibited strong inhibitory activities against both cyclooxygenase‐1 (COX‐1) and cyclooxygenase‐2 (COX‐2). Amentoflavone showed the most potent inhibition, with IC 50 values of 2.35 ± 0.05 µM for COX‐1 and 5.14 ± 0.16 µM for COX‐2. In addition, a validated HPLC method was established for simultaneous quantification. Quantitative analysis of 11 batches revealed pronounced variability in biflavonoid content across different geographical origins, highlighting the necessity of multi‐marker quality evaluation. Overall, these results provide insights into the chemical basis, anti‐inflammatory activity, and quality evaluation of S. tamariscina .