Estudo farmacológico de extratos polares da Virola surinamensis (Myristicaceae) (Rol) Warb. na pressão arterial e na contração do músculo esquelético de roedores

Abstract

Virola surinamensis (Myristicaceae), popularly known as ucuuba, ucuuba branca and sucuuba, is widely distributed in flooded areas of the Amazonian Forest. The bark resin is used in the folk medicine to treat erysipela and the tea of the leaves, to treat colics, dyspepsia, inflammations and malaria. The main constituents described for V. surinamensis are arylpropanoids, neolignans, lignans, lignoids, flavonoids, diarylpropanes, -butirolactones, alkaloids and acid benzoic derivatives. Among them, lignans and neolignans showed anti-parasitic and anti-fungal activities. Previous pharmacological studies described anti-parasitic effect of the essential oils and anti-leishmania, anti-inflammatory, anti-fungal, insecticide and gastroprotective actions. The aim of this work was to study the pharmacological activity of the standardized buthanolic fraction of Virola surinamensis and the mechanisms of the hypotensive effect and the potentiation of the skeletal muscle contraction. The chemical standardization was obtained after partition of the leaves aqueous extract (AE) in n-buthanol originating the buthanolic fraction (BuF). The BuF purification by high performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) originated 10 high purity fractions (F1 to F10) that are still in identification process. The pharmacological screening of AE and BuF showed low action in the CNS. In the arterial blood pressure of anesthetized rats, the intravenous injection of both AE and BuF produced hypotension apparently associated with the α1-adrenoceptors blockade. The BuF was effective to reduce the arterial blood pressure in the chronic treatment also. The absorbed substances did not modify the animal behavior in the Irwin Test, but produced reversible hypotension initiating in 30 min, time necessary to the gastric emptiness. The treatment during 7 days did not modify the animal behavior, but there was a residual accumulated effect of the BuF reducing the basal arterial blood pressure of the rats. In the isolated aortic rings without endothelium, the BuF relaxed the tonus induced by noradrenalin in a concentration-dependent manner, showing that BuF did not interfere with the NO system. This effect was indicative of a competitive antagonism and reinforced the evidences obtained in the arterial blood pressure that the mechanism of the hypotension produced by BuF was the α1 adrenoceptors blockade. The BuF potentiated the direct elicited twitches of the rat diaphragm. In microssomes isolated from the rabbit skeletal muscle, BuF inhibited the Ca2+-ATPase activity similarly to thapsigargin, indicating that the potentiation of the diaphragm contraction may be related to the decrease in the Ca2+ uptake by the sarcoplasmic reticulum.