Pharmacological Effects of Rutaecarpine, an Alkaloid Isolated from Evodia rutaecarpa

Chinese herbs have been widely used as important remedies in oriental medicine and in recent decades many biologically active constituents of selected herbs have been isolated and evaluated for their pharmacological activity. Evodia rutaecarpa(Chinese name: WuChu-Yu) is a well-known traditional Chinese medicine that has been used for a long time in Chinese medical practice. The dried unripened fruit of Evodia rutaecarpais used as a remedy for gastrointestinal disorders (abdominal pain, dysentery), headache, amenorrhea, and postpartum hemorrhage (1). It has also been claimed to have a remarkable central stimulant effect (1), a transient hypertensive effect (1,2), and positive inotropic and chronotropic effects (3). In phytochemical studies a wide variety of compounds, including alkaloids, were found in the fruits of this plant. The alkaloid constituents of this fruit include rutaecarpine, evodiamine, wuchuyine, hydroxyevodiamine (rhesinine), dehydroevodiamine, evocarpine, 1-methyl-2-pentadecyl-4-(1H)-quinolone,1-methyl-2-tridecyl-4(1H)-quinolone (dihydroevocarpine), 1-methyl-2-undecyl-4-(1H)-quinolone, dihydrorutaecarpine, and 14-formyldihydrorutaecarpine (4). Non-alkaloid constituents include rutaevin, limonin (evodin), evodol, evodinone, evogin, gushuyic and other fatty acids (5). Several of these components are known to possess pharmacological activity. For example, dehydroevodiamine, which is formed by the reduction of evodiamine, induces hypotension, bradycardia, and vasodilation, and it has antiarrhythmic activity (6,7). Evodiamine has a positive inotropic effect on isolated left atria from guinea pigs (8) and an antianoxic action in KCN-induced anoxia in mice (9). The cardiovascular effects of dehydroevodiamine and evodiamine have been reported previously (6,7,10,11). Recently Chiou et al (11) reported that rutaecarpine has a vasodilator effect on isolated rat mesenteric arteries by an endotheliumand nitric oxide (NO)-dependent mechanism. We found that rutaecarpine inhibits aggregation of human platelets by inhibition of phospholipase C activity