Aqueous extracts of FBD, a Chinese herb formula composed of Poria cocos, Atractylodes macrocephala, and Angelica sinensis reverse scopolamine induced memory deficit in ICR mice

Abstract

Herb formula FBD is composed of fu ling [or poria, or the sclerotium of the fungus of Poria cocos (Schw.) Wolf (Polyporaceae)], bai zhu [white atractylodes rhizome, or the rhizome of Atractylodes macrocephala Koidz.(Compositae)], and dang gui [or dong quai, Chinese angelica root, or the root of Angelica sinensis (Oliv.) Diels (Umbelliferae)], the three Chinese medicinal plants used traditionally to improve cognitive disorders. The present study aimed to observe the effects of dual doses of aqueous extracts of FBD (200 and  600 mg/kg) administered orally for 6 days on memory deficit induced by scopolamine,  4 mg/kg intraperitoneally (i.p.) in male imprinting control region (ICR) mice. Aqueous extracts of FBD markedly ameliorated scopolamine induced memory deficit in passive step-through avoidance test and passage water maze test, significantly inhibited acetylcholinesterase (AChE) activity in cortex and hippocampus, and circulating butyrylcholinesterase activity. Moreover, cortical AChE activity in vitro was suppressed in a dose-dependent manner by aqueous extracts of FBD at 50–200 μg crude herb/mL, in which dang gui extract exerted a stronger anti-AChE activity than that of fu ling or bai zhu. In contrast, no acute toxicity was observed within 14 days, after administration with FBD extracts at the maximal tolerable dose of 69 g/kg. These results suggested that FBD might be a potential and safe herbal agent for Alzheimer’s disease, and its nootropic action was mediated, in part, via enhancing the cholinergic nervous system.

Keywords::

• Acetylcholinesterase
• Alzheimer’s
• disease
• Angelica sinensis
• Atractylodes macrocephala
• Butyrylcholinesterase
• Poria cocos
• memory

Acknowledgements

We thank Min Chen (Ph.D.) from the Department of Pharmacology and Pharmaceutical Sciences, University of Southern California, and Domenic Caravetta (Ph.D.) from Unilever Research, China, for reviewing the manuscript. This work was supported by the research program of the National New Drug Foundation of China (969010538), and the general programs of the National Natural Science Foundation of China (30271604 & 30500683).

Declaration of interest: The authors report no conflicts of interest. The authors alone are responsible for the content and writing of the paper.