Alzheimer's disease (AD) is characterized by the progressive accumulation of extracellular β-amyloid (Aβ) aggregates. Recently, lignans and phenylpropanoids are attracting increasing attention to discovery useful agents of inhibition on Aβ aggregation. In the present study, to develop potential agents for slowing the progression of AD, Prunus tomentosa seeds were selected as a raw material for bioactive compounds, which led to the separation of two pairs of new enantiomeric lignans and phenylpropanoids using chiral HPLC. The planar structures of these compounds were elucidated by spectroscopic data analyses. And their absolute configurations were determined by comparing of experimental and calculated electronic circular dichroism (ECD). The biosynthesis pathway was also discussed. Additionally, the inhibitory activity on Aβ aggregation of all optical pure compounds was tested by thioflavin T (ThT) assay. The isolates (1a, 1b, 2a and 2b) showed more potent inhibitory activity than positive control curcumin with inhibitory rate of 73.89 ± 3.41% 78.69 ± 1.50%, 63.25 ± 2.68%, and 67.13 ± 0.90% at 20 μM, respectively. More importantly, the inhibition profiles were explained by molecular dynamics and docking simulation studies.

中文翻译：

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毛白李种子中的苯丙烷和木脂素是有效的β-淀粉样蛋白（Aβ）聚集抑制剂。

阿尔茨海默氏病（AD）的特征在于细胞外β-淀粉样蛋白（Aβ）聚集体的逐步积累。近年来，木脂素和苯丙烷类正逐渐引起人们对发现有用的抑制Aβ聚集的物质的关注。在本研究中，为了开发出延缓AD进展的潜在药物，选择了毛白李种子作为生物活性化合物的原料，这导致使用手性HPLC分离两对新的对映体木脂素和苯基丙烷。通过光谱数据分析阐明了这些化合物的平面结构。通过比较实验和计算的电子圆二色性（ECD）来确定它们的绝对构型。还讨论了生物合成途径。此外，采用硫代黄素T（ThT）法检测了所有光学纯化合物对Aβ聚集的抑制活性。分离物（1a，1b，2a和2b）显示出比阳性对照姜黄素更强的抑制活性，在20μM时抑制率分别为73.89±3.41％78.69±1.50％，63.25±2.68％和67.13±0.90％。更重要的是，通过分子动力学和对接模拟研究来解释抑制曲线。