Novel anti-ulcerogenic effects of total extract and isolated compounds from Cakile arabica

Background and Objective: Natural products take a special interest in the discovery of new anti-ulcerogenic drugs. Family Brassicaceae is one of the most important families in use for many investigations. Cakile arabica (Velen) was used in folk medicine in treatment of gastric disorder with no scientific approve, so the aim of this study was to investigate its contents and prove their biological activities. Materials and Methods: Different chromatographic equipment and instrument were used for isolation such as column chromatography. Identification of compounds were done by several spectroscopic methods; 1H-NMR. The 13C-NMR and DEPT COSY, HSQC and HMBC. Absolute ethanol-induced ulcer model in rats were used to evaluate the anti-ulcerogenic activity using reference standard drug ranitidine (100 mg kg^–1). Results: Ten compounds were isolated from C. arabica for the first time and were identified as: (1) α-amyrin, (2) β-sitosterol, (3) Tetracosanoic acid, (4) 4-hydroxy-5-n-butoxy-5-oxopentanoic acid, (5) Scopoletine, (6) Umbelliferone, (7) Esculetin, (8) Kaempferol, (9) Quercetin and (10) Quercetin-3-O-rutninoside. The total alcohol extract (1000 mg kg^–1) and the isolated compounds (50 mg kg^–1) showed anti-ulcerogenic activity with different potentials. The total alcohol extract was the most effective agent in this study, as it showed 98.5% protection of control ulcer followed by compounds tetracosanoic acid and 4-hydroxy-5-n-butoxy-5-oxopentanoic acid, which produced 80 and 55.5%, respectively while standard ranitidine produced 46.2%. The total alcohol extract was safe up to 4000 mg kg^–1 and showed no side effects on liver and kidney functions when administrated orally for 15 consecutive days at dose 1000 mg kg^–1. Conclusion: The cytoprotective mechanism may explain the potent anti-ulcerogenic activity of the Cakile arabica extract and the isolated compounds. Compounds tetracosanoic acid and 4-hydroxy-5-n-butoxy-5-oxopentanoic acid could be the main active constituents as they showed highest activities between compounds. But it is clear that there was a synergistic activity between compounds as the activity of the total extract exceeds the activity of any compound alone.