Arctiin is a

lignan The lignans are a large group of low molecular weight polyphenols found in plants, particularly seeds, whole grains, and vegetables. The name derives from the Latin word for "wood". Lignans are precursors to phytoestrogens. They may play a rol ...

found in many

plants Plants are the eukaryotes that form the kingdom Plantae; they are predominantly photosynthetic. This means that they obtain their energy from sunlight, using chloroplasts derived from endosymbiosis with cyanobacteria to produce sugars f ...

of the family

Asteraceae Asteraceae () is a large family (biology), family of flowering plants that consists of over 32,000 known species in over 1,900 genera within the Order (biology), order Asterales. The number of species in Asteraceae is rivaled only by the Orchi ...

, particularly the greater burdock (''Arctium lappa'') and ''Centaurea imperialis'', and in ''Trachelospermum asiaticum'', ''Saussurea heteromalla'', Retrieved on April 25, 2011. and ''Forsythia viridissima''. Retrieved on September 14, 2008 through

Google Book Search Google Books (previously known as Google Book Search, Google Print, and by its code-name Project Ocean) is a service from Google that searches the full text of books and magazines that Google has scanned, converted to text using optical charac ...

. It is the

glucoside A glucoside is a glycoside that is chemically derived from glucose. Glucosides are common in plants, but rare in animals. Glucose is produced when a glucoside is hydrolysed by purely chemical means, or decomposed by fermentation or enzymes. Th ...

of arctigenin. Arctiin and arctigenin have shown anticancer effects in

animal research Animal testing, also known as animal experimentation, animal research, and ''in vivo'' testing, is the use of animals, as model organisms, in experiments that seek answers to scientific and medical questions. This approach can be contrasted ...

. They have been found to act as

agonist An agonist is a chemical that activates a Receptor (biochemistry), receptor to produce a biological response. Receptors are Cell (biology), cellular proteins whose activation causes the cell to modify what it is currently doing. In contrast, an R ...

s of the adiponectin receptor 1.

References

External links

Arctiin
entry in the public domain NCI Dictionary of Cancer Terms Adiponectin receptor agonists Lignan glucosides O-methylated natural phenols Furanones Tetrahydrofurans {{Aromatic-stub