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Isoliquiritigenin, a potential therapeutic agent for treatment of inflammation-associated diseases
Ziyi Chen1, Wenwen Ding1, Xiaoxue Yang1
1School of Life Sciences, Beijing University of Chinese Medicine, Beijing, China.
Ethnopharmacological Relevance:
Licorice is a medicinal herb with a 2000-year history of applications in traditional Chinese medicine. Isoliquiritigenin (ISL) is a bioactive chalcone compound isolated from licorice. It has attracted increasing attention in recent years due to its excellent anti-inflammatory activity.
Aim Of The Study:
This study is to provide a comprehensive summary of the anti-inflammatory activity of ISL and the underlying molecular mechanisms, and discuss new insights for its potential clinical applications as an anti-inflammation agent.
Materials And Methods:
We examined literatures published in the past twenty years from PubMed, Research Gate, Web of Science, Google Scholar, and SciFinder, with single or combined key words of "isoliquiritigenin", "inflammation", and "anti-inflammatory".
Results:
ISL elicits its anti-inflammatory activity by mediating various cellular processes. It inhibits the upstream of the nuclear factor kappa B (NF-κB) pathway and activates the nuclear factor erythroid related factor 2 (Nrf2) pathway. In addition, it suppresses the NOD-like receptor protein 3 (NLRP3) pathway and restrains the mitogen-activated protein kinase (MAPK) pathway.
Conclusions:
Current studies indicate a great therapeutical potential of ISL as a drug candidate for treatment of inflammation-associated diseases. However, the pharmacokinetics, biosafety, and bioavailability of ISL remain to be further investigated.
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