Species of genus Tripterygium (Celastraceae) have attracted much attention owing to their excellent effect on treating autoimmune and inflammatory diseases. However, due to high market demand causing overexploitation, natural populations of genus Tripterygium have rapidly declined. Tripterygium medicinal materials are mainly collected from the wild, making the quality of medicinal materials uns...

This study aimed to explore the therapeutic efficacy of tripterygium glycosides for experimental autoimmune myasthenia gravis (EAMG). EAMG model was established in rats, and the rats were divided into complete Freund’s adjuvant group, EAMG model group and tripterygium glycosides treatment group. All rats were evaluated by Lennon scoring and body mass monitoring. We found that the treatment with...

The aim of this meta-analysis was to evaluate the clinical efficacy and safety of tripterygium glycosides in treatment of stage IV diabetic nephropathy. Methods Through searching the PubMed and CNKI databases, the open published clinically controlled trials related to efficacy and safety of tripterygium glycosides in the treatment of stage IV diabetic nephropathy were collected. The pooled tota...

The commercial preparation named “Tripterygium glycosides” prepared by column chromatography has been used for the treatment of inflammatory and autoimmune diseases with significant efficacy but concurrent toxicity. The aim of this study was to reduce the toxicity of Tripterygium extracts, using cytotoxicity and anti-inflammatory activity of the three principal active components of Tripterygium...

We report an 80-year-old male patient with severe rheumatoid arthritis who was treated with tripterygium glycoside, an immunosuppressive agent made from the extract of a Chinese medicinal herb called Tripterygium wilfordii Hook F. The patient had no apparent skin lesions before the treatment, but he developed aggressive hyperkeratotic lesions with rapid progression after using tripterygium glyc...

Two new abietane diterpene glycosides, wilfordosides A (1) and B (2), were isolated from the roots of Tripterygium wilfordii. The structures of compounds 1 and 2 were established using spectroscopic methods including extensive 1D and 2D NMR analysis, in combination with chemical reactions.

Tripterygium wilfordii Hook. f. is a traditional Chinese herb (Murphy, 2006; Qiu et al., 2003). The extract of Tripterygium wilfordii Hook. f. has been widely applied to the treatment of immune-related diseases, such as rheumatoid arthritis (RA), nephritis, and systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE) (Chang et al., 1999; Wang et al., 2000). Extracts of Tripterygium wilfordii Hook. f. have been shown...

Members of the genus Tripterygium are known to contain an astonishing diversity of specialized metabolites. The lack of authentic standards has been an impediment to the rapid identification of such metabolites in extracts. We employed an approach that involves the searching of multiple, complementary chromatographic and spectroscopic data sets against the Spektraris database to speed up the me...

Celastrus and Tripterygium species, which are used in traditional Chinese medicine, have attracted much attention due to their anti-tumor promoting and neuroprotective activities, in addition to their applications in autoimmune disorders. However, systematic relationships between them and among species are unclear, and it may disturb their further medicinal utilization. In the present study, th...

Triptolide (TP), a major extract of the herb Tripterygium wilfordii Hook F (TWHF), has been shown to exert potent pharmacological effects, especially an immunosuppressive effect in the treatment of rheumatoid arthritis (RA). However, its multiorgan toxicity prevents it from being widely used in clinical practice. Recently, several attempts are being performed to reduce TP toxicity. In this revi...