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Decontextualised Chinese medicines
Published in Vivienne Lo, Michael Stanley-Baker, Dolly Yang, Routledge Handbook of Chinese Medicine, 2022
Michael Heinrich, Ka Yui Kum, Ruyu Yao
Known as goji or 枸杞 (Gouqi, in Chinese, the fruit of Lycium barbarum L.), goji berry has been used as a traditional medicine and food for over 2000 years in China and other Asian countries (Yao et al. 2018a). In some regions, such as Japan and South Korea, the fruit of L. chinense Mill. is also used, although these two species have obvious differences in their metabolomic profiles (Yao et al. 2018b). While the plant was introduced into the global North in the eighteenth century, it was not a popular health food until the twenty-first century.
Plant Source Foods
Published in Chuong Pham-Huy, Bruno Pham Huy, Food and Lifestyle in Health and Disease, 2022
Chuong Pham-Huy, Bruno Pham Huy
Goji berry or wolfberry has two main species: Lycium barbarum and Lychium chinense, both belonging to the Solanaceae family. The species L. barbarum is widely cultivated for food and traditional medicine in China. Goji berry is native to Northwest China. The fruit has an ovoid shape with about 0.6–2 cm in length and 0.3–1 cm in diameter with deep orange-red waxy skin. The fruit contains 20–50 seeds and has a sweet and fruity taste and a creamy-white flesh (85). Harvested fresh goji berries are sun-dried for several days before marketing for culinary or medicinal uses. Dried goji can store well for up to one year. Dried goji berries are an excellent source of energy and essential nutrients (sugars, proteins, dietary fibers, vitamins). They contain several potentially bioactive components arabinogalactanproteins (AGPs), the carotenoid zeaxanthin, and the vitamin C precursor: β-D-glucopyranosyl ascorbic acid (85). AGPs are soluble glycoconjugates or soluble polysaccharides or a type of glycans. The main biological properties of AGPs are: modulation of the immune system, antitumor activity, and antioxidant activity (85).
Wolfberry (goji berry)
Published in Linda M. Castell, Samantha J. Stear (Nottingham), Louise M. Burke, Nutritional Supplements in Sport, Exercise and Health, 2015
Richard J. Godfrey, David S. Senchina
Wolfberry and goji berry are interchangeable terms for the red fruits of either of the two boxthorn plants in the potato family, Lycium barbarum (syn. Lycium halimifolium) and Lycium chinense. Both are important herbal components of traditional Chinese medicine, where they are often referred to as gou qi. The berries (i.e. fructus barbarum, fructus lycii) are used for both food and medicine whereas root bark (cortex lycii radicis) is used solely for medicine (Potterat, 2010). These plants should not be confused with Solanum lycocarpum, variously known as wolf’s apple, wolf’s fruit or fruit-of-the-wolf, which contains toxic alkaloids. Wolfberry fruits are the plant component used most often in sports supplements and contain several purported bioactive molecules including carotenoids, flavonoids, vitamins including plentiful vitamin C, sterols and polysaccharides (Potterat, 2010). Bioavailability studies suggest that, when berries are extracted in milk as in traditional Chinese medicine, zeaxanthins (a subclass of carotenoids) are found in the bloodstream, peaking at six hours post-ingestion (Benzie et al., 2006).
Herbal and Natural Dietary Products: Upcoming Therapeutic Approach for Prevention and Treatment of Hepatocellular Carcinoma
Published in Nutrition and Cancer, 2021
Deepa S. Mandlik, Satish K. Mandlik
Wolfberry is a well-known Chinese fruit useful in the management of liver and eye-related disorders. Lycium polysaccharide portion (LPP), is the utmost crucial part of Lycium barbarum that has abundant of biological activities such as antioxidant, neuroprotective and immuno-protection, anti-tumor and glucose metabolism regulation. The LPP has inhibited the propagation of hepatocytes and leads to apoptosis of liver hepatoma cells thus, indicating its anti-cancerous role (26). The result of a clinical trial showed that consumption of LPP juice leads to an elevation in the interleukin (IL)-2, immunoglobulin G, serum antioxidants levels, lymphocyte count and diminutions of lipid peroxides levels in human beings (27). The apoptotic activity of two different fractions of L. barbarum polysaccharides (LBP) such as LBP-d and LBP-e were studied on hepatoma SMMC-7721 cancerous cell lines. The two fractions of LBP obstructed the growth of the SMMC-7721 cells at G0/G1 and S phases with improved calcium concentration in the cell cytoplasm (28). The expressions of a gene linked to proliferation, oxidative stress, apoptosis and cancer (down-regulation of CCL5, DUSP1, GPx-3, PTGS1, and up-regulation of MT3) were found to be altered on treatment with extract of L. barbarum berries on HepG2 carcinoma cells (29).
SIRT 3 was involved in Lycium barbarum seed oil protection testis from oxidative stress: in vitro and in vivo analyses
Published in Pharmaceutical Biology, 2021
Zhang-Jie Yang, Yu-Xin Wang, Shuai Zhao, Na Hu, Dong-Mei Chen, Hui-Ming Ma
Lycium barbarum L. (Solanaceae) is a traditional food and Chinese medicine that has nourished the liver and kidney (Tan et al. 2019) and has maintained fertility for thousands of years (Ren et al. 2019). Traditionally, Lycium barbarum seed oil (LBSO) is extracted from Lycium barbarum seeds, cultured in the northwest of China, and widely used as a functional food (Potterat 2010). Several studies have shown that grape seed oil delays senescence by attenuating oxidative (Harbeoui et al. 2019) and inflammatory responses (Millan-Linares et al. 2018). Other oils, such as rice bran oil (Lee et al. 2019), olive oil (Perrone et al. 2019), and sunflower oil (Navarro-Hortal et al. 2019), also achieve a similar effect in anti-ageing. Therefore, the present study investigated the active functions on the antioxidative stress of LBSO and showed the effects of L. barbarum on protecting individuals from ageing by antioxidation and anti-inflammation; however, the active components of L. barbarum are yet elusive (Gao et al. 2017). Thus, this study investigated the effect of LBSO on antioxidative stress and illuminated the potential mechanism that might activate SIRT3.
Inhibition of CYP2C9 by natural products: insight into the potential risk of herb-drug interactions
Published in Drug Metabolism Reviews, 2020
Kai Wang, Qing Gao, Tingting Zhang, Jinqiu Rao, Liqin Ding, Feng Qiu
There have been a number of clinical cases of herb-drug interactions (HDIs) when drugs have been coadministered with herbal extracts. Coadministration of Lycium barbarum L., also known as goji berry, with warfarin for a period of time could elevate the international normalized ratio (INR) and cause associated bleeding (Lam et al. 2001; Zhang et al. 2015). Another study showed that the ethanol extracts of Lycium barbarum L. resulted in significantly potent inhibition of CYP2C9 (Liu et al. 2016). Unfortunately, the components responsible for CYP2C9 inhibition have not been revealed. In addition, extracts of grape seed, Rhodiola rosea L., Launaea taraxacifolia, and Tinospora cordifolia have been demonstrated to result in significant inhibition of CYP2C9 (Etheridge et al. 2007; Thomford et al. 2016; Thu et al. 2017; Sahu et al. 2018). Therefore, further studies are urgently needed to determine which component(s) of these plants and which mechanism(s) of action are involved.