earticle

영어

To treat hyperpigmentating diseases such as such as melasma and lentigines, a number of melanogenesis inhibitors have been screened for their effectiveness in reducing melanin but none have shown to be completely satisfactory. To develop a novel skin depigmenting agent from natural sources, the inhibition of melanogenesis by Chinese plant, N. glandulifrea, was evaluated. The methanol extract of this plant showed significantly down-regulated melanin synthesis in a dose dependent manner at a non-toxic concentration in cultured B16F10 mouse melanoma cells. This extract was further fractionated by using bioactivity-guided fractionation and identified as glycerol monolinoleate by means of NMR, IR and HPLC. This compound showed significant depigmenting activity melan-a cells. Compared with arbutin (IC50 = 0.74 mM) as a positive control, the depigmentation IC50 value for this compound was 9.1 mM. Its inhibitory effect on cellular tyrosinase, the key enzyme of melanogenesis, was observed. The effect of this compound on tyrosinase and MITF protein was also investigated. These results suggest that glycerol monolinolate isolated from N. glandulifera is a promising compound that could be useful for treating hyperpigmentation as a skin-whitening agent.