Looking for agonists of β₂ adrenergic receptor from Fuzi and Chuanwu by virtual screening and dual-luciferase reporter assay

Abstract

More and more studies demonstrated that β₂ adrenergic receptor (β₂-AR) plays a crucial role for the treatment of heart failure. Chuanwu and Fuzi have been used over thousands of years in China for the treatment of heart failure. Considering the effects of these herbs are very similar to β₂-AR agonists, we presume whether β₂-AR agonists can be found from Fuzi and Chuanwu. Fuzi and Chuanwu decoction were used to receive the luciferase reporter activity assay to verify the hypothesis, and the result is positive and encouraging. For it is very difficult to get all of the monomer compounds of Fuzi and Chuanwu, virtual screening was used to find potential β₂-AR agonists and a cell-based β₂-AR agonist functional evaluation model, combined with a luciferase reporter assay system, was used to confirm the final result. In this research, 45 compounds were identified as β₂-AR agonists, and four compounds were verified and the rest need further experiment.

Keywords:

• β₂ Adrenergic receptor
• Fuzi
• Chuanwu
• virtual screening
• luciferase reporter assay

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by National Basic Research Program of China (973 Program) [grant number 2011CB505300], [grant number 2011CB505302]; National Natural Science Foundation of China [grant number 81373506].