Tropical Journal of Pharmaceutical Research

Original Research Article | OPEN ACCESS

Chemical constituents, and pharmacological and toxicological effects of Cynomorium songaricum: An overview

Dan Cheng¹, Junchao Zheng¹, Suya Ma¹, Ghulam Murtaza^1-3, Awais Wahab¹, Changying Yu¹, Jingwei Liu¹, Yi Lu¹

¹School of Preclinical Medicine, Beijing University of Chinese Medicine, Beijing 100029, China; ²Department of Pharmacy, COMSATS Institute of Information Technology Abbottabad, Pakistan; ³Institute of Automation, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, China.

For correspondence:- Yi Lu Email: yilubucm@gmail.com Tel:+8664286576

Accepted: 21 October 2017 Published: 30 November 2017

Citation: Cheng D, Zheng J, Ma S, Murtaza G, Wahab A, Yu C, et al. Chemical constituents, and pharmacological and toxicological effects of Cynomorium songaricum: An overview. Trop J Pharm Res 2017; 16(11):2689-2696 doi: 10.4314/tjpr.v16i11.17

© 2017 The authors.
This is an Open Access article that uses a funding model which does not charge readers or their institutions for access and distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0) and the Budapest Open Access Initiative (http://www.budapestopenaccessinitiative.org/read), which permit unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly credited..

Abstract

Purpose: To review the chemical constituents, and the pharmacological and toxicological effects of Cynomorium songaricum (C. songaricum) and explore its potentials for further development as an alternative medicine.

Methods: A large number of research articles related to “Cynomorium songaricum” “pharmacological effects”, “toxicological effects” and “chemical composition” in English and Chinese language were retrieved through an extensive literature review using various electronic databases including Medline (1966 - 2017) and EMBASE (1980 - 2017).

Results: Ethyl acetate and aqueous extracts of C. songaricum have promising pharmacological activities, due to the presence of various flavonoids, triterpenes and polysaccharides. In addition to promising effects against inflammation, aging, fatigue, viruses and cancer, C. songaricum has a protective effect on the nervous system and regulates hormones and immune functions. Oxidative regulation of hormone levels has a certain correlation with its pharmacological activities, e.g., cognitive functions, but its mechanism is not yet known, indicating the need for further research. Toxicity studies on C. songaricum have shown that it is not genotoxic to animals, but further toxicological studies are required to ascertain its safety in clinical use.

Conclusion: C. songaricum is a biologically important plant which has many proven bioactivities; however, it requires further studies to determine the mechanistic aspects of its pharmacological effects

Keywords: Cynomorium, Chemical constituents, Inflammation, Aging, Fatigue, Virus, Tumor, Toxicological effect