A rapid study of botanical drug-drug interaction with protein by re-ligand fishing using human serum albumin-functionalized magnetic nanoparticles

Abstract

A great many active constituents of botanical drugs bind to human serum albumin (HSA) reversibly with a dynamic balance between the free- and boundforms in blood. The curative or side effect of a drug depends on its free-form level, which is always influenced by other drugs, combined dosed or multi-constituents of botanical drugs. This paper presented a rapid and convenient methodology to investigate the drug-drug interactions with HSA. The interaction of two steroidal saponins, dioscin and pseudo-protodioscin, from a botanical drug was studied for their equilibrium time and equilibrium amount by re-ligand fishing using HSA functionalized magnetic nanoparticles. A clear competitive situation was obtained by this method. The equilibrium was reached soon about 15 s at a ratio of 0.44F 1. Furthermore, the interaction of pseudo-protodioscin to total steroidal saponins from DAXXK was also studied. The operation procedures of this method were faster and more convenient compared with other methods reported.