Sialidases are enzymes that catalyze the hydrolysis of sialic acid residues from various glycoconjugates, which are widely found in a number of viral and microbial pathogens. In this study, we investigated the biological evaluation of isolated six shikonins (1-6) and three shikonofurans (7-9) from Lithospermum erythrorhizon. The nine isolated compounds 1-9 showed strong and selective inhibition of glycosyl hydrolase (GH) 33 and -34 sialidases activities. In GH33 bacterial-sialidase inhibition assay, the inhibitory activities against GH33 siadliase of all shikonofuran derivatives (7-9) were greater than shikonin derivatives (1-6). Shikonofuran E (8) exhibited the most potent inhibitory activity toward GH33 sialidases (IC(50)=0.24μM). Moreover, our detailed kinetic analysis of these species unveiled that they are all competitive and simple reversible slow-binding inhibitors. Otherwise, they showed different inhibitory capacities and kinetic modes to GH34 viral-sialidase activity. All the naphthoquinone derivatives (1-6) were of almost equal efficiency with IC(50) value of 40μM and shikonofurans (7-9) did not show the significant inhibitory effect to GH34 sialidase. Kinetic analyses indicated that naphthoquinones acted via a noncompetitive mechanism.
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