Biol. Pharm. Bull., 28(10),1915-1918, October 2005

Regular Articles

Antinociceptive Anti-inflammatory Effect of Monotropein Isolated from the Root of Morinda officinalis

Jongwon CHOI,^a Kyung-Tae LEE,^b Moo-Young CHOI,^c Jung-Hwan NAM,^d Hyun-Ju JUNG,^d Sun-Kyu PARK,^d and Hee-Juhn PARK^*,d

^a College of Pharmacy, Daeyeon-Dong, Kyungsung University; Busan 608-736, Korea: ^b College of Pharmacy, Dongdaemun-ku, Hoegi-Dong, Kyung-Hee University; Seoul 130-701, Korea: ^c Department of Food and Nutrition, Sangji University; Woosan-Dong, Wonju 220-702, Korea: and ^d Department of Botanical Resources, Sangji University; Woosan-Dong, Wonju 220-702, Korea. * To whom correspondence should be addressed. e-mail: hjpark@mail.sangji.ac.kr

The root of Morinda officinalis (Rubiaceae) is used to treat rheumatoid arthritis and impotence in the traditional Oriental medicine. To identify the antinociceptive anti-inflammatory components of this crude drug, we adopted an activity-directed fractionation approach. The active fraction of the BuOH extract of M. officinalis root was subjected to silica gel and ODS column chromatography to yield two diterpenes, compounds 1 and 2 and these were identified as monotropein and deacetylasperulosidic acid, respectively. The iridoid glycoside, monotropein, was tested for its anti-inflammatory antinociceptive effects using hot plate- and writhing antinociceptive assays and by using carrageenan-induced anti-inflammatory assays in mice and rats. Pretreatment with monotropein (at 20, 30 mg/kg/d, p.o.) significantly reduced stretching episodes and prolonged action time in mice. It also significantly reduced acute paw edema by carrageenan in rats. These results indicate that monotropein contributes to the antinociceptive and anti-inflammatory action of Morinda officinalis root.

Key words Morinda officinalis; Rubiaceae; iridoid glycoside; monotropein; antinociceptive; anti-inflammatory