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The seeds of Chinese horse chestnut are used as a source of starch and escin, whereas the potential use of whole plant has been ignored. The astringency and bitterness of tea produced from the leaves and flowers were found to be significantly better than those of green tea, suggesting that the enriched flavonoids maybe sensory determinates. During 47 flavonoids identified in leaves and flowers, seven flavonol glycosides in the top 10 including astragalin and isoquercitrin were significantly higher content in flowers than in leaves. The crude proteins of flowers could catalyze flavonol glucosides' formation, in which three glycosyltransferases contributed to the flavonol glucosylation were screened out by multi-dimensional integration of transcriptome, evolutionary analyses, recombinant enzymatic analysis and molecular docking. The deep exploration for flavonol profile and glycosylation provides theoretical and experimental basis for utilization of flowers and leaves of Aesculus chinensis as additives and dietary supplements. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Six new triterpenoid saponins, aesculusosides A-F (1-6), together with 19 known ones, were isolated from the seeds of Aesculus chinensis. The new structures were elucidated through extensive spectroscopic analyses and by comparison with previously reported data. Some of the isolates were evaluated for their cytotoxic activities against MCF-7 cell line by an MTT assay, and compounds 15, 16, 19, and 23-25 exhibited inhibitory activities against MCF-7 with IC50 values ranging from 7.1 to 31.3 μM. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A study was conducted to determine the physiological characteristics changes of Aesculus chinensis seeds during natural dehydration in 2003. The results showed that A. chinensis seeds were recalcitrant with being highly desiccation-sensitive. The seed moisture content of fresh fruits was higher than 60%. When the seeds were naturally dried for 30 days, their moisture content declined to 30.2% and their viability was completely lost. The seed germination percentage had a small increase at the beginning of desiccation and then decreased rapidly. The relative electrical conductivity of the A. chinensis seeds increased along with a decrease in seed moisture content. However, there was an abnormal increase in relative electrical conductivity when the seed moisture content was between 53.7% and 50.9%. Superoxide dismutase (SOD) activity decreased rapidly in the period of desiccation except for an abnormality when the seed moisture content was between 53.7% and 50.9%. Malondialdehyde (MDA) content increased slowly at the early stage of desiccation and then rose rapidly after the moisture content was below 50.9%. The soluble sugar content in seeds slowly increased with the increasing period of desiccation. The seed germination percentage was at the high level when seed moisture content was in range of 47%–60%, which suggests that this was the optimum moisture content for maintaining A. chinensis seed viability. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Four isomeric bioactive saponin compounds named escin la, isoescin la, escin Ib, and isoescin Ib were successfully isolated and purified from the crude extract of the seeds of a traditional Chinese medicinal plant Aesculus chinensis Bge (Hippocastanaceae) by preparatory high performance liquid chromatography (Pre-HPLC). The gradient mobile phase solvent system composed of methanolwater- acetic acid was employed. An efficient large scale preparatory method was developed based on the stability investigation of escin la for the first time. A total amount of 5.2 g escin la, 2.8 g isoescin la, 3.8 g escin Ib, and 1.6 g isoescin Ib, separately, over 99% purity was obtained from 50 g of total saponins. The preparatory purification of four isomeric saponins by Pre-HPLC was completed in 120 min in a one step separation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The complete chloroplast genome of Aesculus chinensis was obtained with Illumina HiSeq X Ten. The chloroplast genome is 155,528 bp in length, including a pair of inverted repeat (IR) regions of 25,656 bp, a large single-copy (LSC) region of 85,489 bp, and a small single-copy (SSC) region of 18,727 bp. It contains 115 genes, including 80 protein-coding genes, 31 transfer RNAs, and four ribosomal RNAs. The total GC content is 37.9%, whereas the corresponding values of the LSC, SSC, and IR regions are 36.1%, 31.8%, and 43.2%, separately. Phylogenetic analysis of the protein-coding genes showed a close relationship with Aesculus wangii in Hippocastanaceae. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]