Structural Analysis Of Polysaccharide CUP From Coriolus Unicolor

Coriolus unicolor(other names:Chimaozhi, Dansegegaijun and Dansexiapihei), wasused as traditional antitumor medicine in China. Monoglycerides and glycopeptides werebioactive materials known in Coriolus unicolor, the monoglycerides had an obviousinhibition on mouse ascites carcinoma and could prolong the animal's life, the glycopeptideshad activities of antitumor, antiradiation and antioxidation. Although there are a lot of reportson the study of polysaccharides from Coriolus versicolor,no reports on the polysaccharidestudy of Coriolus unicolor.Polysaccharides from Coriolus versicolor have high immunomodulatory and antitumoreffects, so it was presumed that polysaccharides from Coriolus unicolor may have similarstructure and activity with them. In this paper, the structure of polysaccharide isolated fromCoriolus unicolor was studied, and the similarity and difference between the two kinds ofpolysaccharides were discussed. The results listed in the paper may be helpful for the studyof other fungi polysaccharides.Main contents: Crude water-soluble polysaccharides were isolated from the fruitingbody of Coriolus unicolor by hot water extraction and precipitated by ethanol. Thepolysaccharide CUP was obtained by successive ethanol fraction, deproteination and gelcolumn chromatography. Homogeneity and molecular weight of CUP were determined by gelcolumn chromatography and High Performance Liquid Chromatography (HPLC). The resultsshowed that CUP was a homogeneous polysaccharide with a molecular weight 1.3×10~4D.The sugar composition analyzed by acetylation and gas chromatography (GC) showed thatCUP was consisted of only glucose.The structure of CUP was elucidated by periodate oxidation, Smith degradation,methylation analysis and 13C nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) analysis. These analysesindicated that CUP has the following structure: the main linkage of CUP was (1→3) linkedglucose(44.8%), including most β-(1→3)glucose and slight α-(1→3)glucose, other linkagesincluding α-(1→4)glucose(11.4%), β-(1→6)glucose(8.0%), (1→4,6)glucose (15.7%) andterminal (1→)glucose(20.2%).