Nerium indicum Mill. belongs to the Apocyaceae family. It is a large branched shrub that is found throughout China, Japan, and India, where it grows both wild and as an ornamental garden plant [1] . The roots, flowers, barks, and leaves of N. indicum have long been used in traditional medicines for treating skin diseases and wound infections, and as an antidote, antileprotic, emetic, expectorant, and sternutatory agent [2] . Phytochemical and pharmacological studies have confirmed that cardiac glycosides are the major bioactive constituents of N. indicum, and these compounds have cardiotonic, diuretic, cytotoxic, antibacterial, anticancer, antiplatelet aggregation, antiinflammatory, hepatoprotective, antihyperlipidemic, antiulcer, and central nervous system depressant properties [3]. In continuation of our studies on chemical constituents from the roots of N. indicum, five cardiac glycosides were isolated and elucidated as gitoxigenin 3-[O- β -D-glucopyranosyl-(1→4)-O-glucopyranosyl(1→4)- β -D-digitaloside] (1), digitoxigenin 3-[O- β -D-glucopyranosyl-(1→6)-O-glucopyranosyl(1→2)- β -D-digitaloside] (2), digitoxigenin 3-{[O- β -D-glucopyranosyl-(1→2)]-[O- β -D-glucopyranosyl-(1→3)]-rhamnoside} (3), 1-acetoxy-3-[O- β -D-glucopyranosyl-(1→4)- β -D-digitaloside]-14-hydroxy-20(22)-enolide (4), and 3-O- β -D-diginoside-1,14-dihydroxycard-20(22)-enolide (5). To the best of our knowledge, all these compounds were obtained from the genus Nerium for the first time.
References. 1. Ahmed S U, Ali M S, Begum F, et al. J Pharm Sci 2006, 5(1): 85-87. 2. Govind P, Satish N, Shobhit S. Int J Biomed Res, 2010, 1: 55-61. 3. Ghate N B, Chaudhuri D, Panja S, et al. Pharm Biology, 2015, 53(7): 1066-1074.
Acknowledgements: This work was funded by the Science Foundation for Young Doctors of Jiangxi academy of science (2016-YYB-07), the Science and Technology Major Project Foundation of Jiangxi Academy of Sciences (2018- YZD2-18) and the Foundation of Key Project of Research and Development Program of Jiangxi Province (No. 20171BBH80017) .