New triterpenic acids from Uncaria rhynchophylla: chemistry, NO-inhibitory activity, and tandem mass spectrometric analysis.

Five new oleanane and ursane type triterpenes, namely uncarinic acids F-J (1-5), together with six known triterpenic acids (6-11) were isolated from the stems and hooks of Uncaria rhynchophylla. Structure elucidation of 1-5 was based on the integrated analyses of high-resolution MS data, 1D ((1)H NMR, (13)C NMR, DEPT) and 2D (HSQC, HMBC, ROESY) NMR spectra. Compounds 4, 10, and 11 exhibited weak inhibitory effects on LPS-induced NO production in RAW264.7 cells (with IC50 1.48, 7.01, and 1.89 μM, respectively) with dexamethasone (IC50 0.04 μM) and quercetin (IC50 0.86 μM) as the positive controls. 19-OH substituted oleanane triterpenic acids (1, 2, 5, 8) were prone to eliminate CH2O3, whereas those ursane-type encompassing 19-OH (3, 6, 7, 9, 4) were featured by preferred cleavage of H2O while performing the negative collision-induced MS/MS fragmentation on an LTQ/Orbitrap mass spectrometer.