68 0009-3130/14/5001-0068 © 2014 Springer Science+Business Media New York Chemistry of Natural Compounds, Vol. 50, No. 1, March, 2014 [Russian original No. 1, January–February, 2014] LIPIDS FROM THE AERIAL PART OF Scutellaria ramosissima N. K. Yuldasheva, 1* N. T. Ulchenko, 1 N. Mamadalieva, 1 A. I. Glushenkova, 1 E. Ovidi, 2 D. Triggiani, 2 and A. Tiezzi 2 Total lipids (TL) (2.1%), more than half of which were glycolipids (GL) (1.3%), and neutral lipids (NL) (0.54%) and phospholipids (PL) (0.26%) were isolated from the air-dried aerial part of Scutellaria ramosissima. The principal acids of the NL were 16:0, 18:2, and 18:3. Acid 16:0 (up to 40 mass% of the acids) dominated the glycolipids. Palmitic and linoleic acids dominated the PL with 18:1 in combination with 18:3 comprising slightly greater than 31%, like linoleic acid. The chlorophyll content was 197.3 mg% in the total lipids; carotinoids, 157.1 mg%; tocopherols, 357.0 mg% in unsaponified substances (US). The cytotoxic activity of the S. ramosissima lipid fractions was tested on HL-60 and HeLa cancer cell lines using the MTT test. PL, NL, and US showed cytotoxicity for HL-60 cells with IC 50 values of 8.3, 22.0, and 24.3 g/mL, respectively, and were inactive for HeLa cells. The GL and TL turned out to be slightly active. Keywords: Scutellaria ramosissima, neutral lipids, glycolipids, phospholipids, unsaponified substances, cytotoxic activity. The genus Scutellaria ranks among those with the most plant species. The plant S. ramosissima M. Pop. is endemic to and grows in Central Asia and in the western Tian-Shan. It is a semi-bush that flowers in July-August and bears fruit in August-September [1, 2]. The plant is used traditionally in Uzbekistan in folk medicine to treat epilepsy, allergy, various inflammations, St. Vitus dance, nervous disorders, and hypertension [3]. Furthermore, extracts of several Scutellaria species inhibit the multiplication of cancer cells and exhibit antitumor activity [4]. The broad spectrum of biological activity of Scutellaria plant extracts is responsible for the continuing study of them. It was found earlier that the aerial part contained 12 flavonoids [5–8]. It was shown [8] that the CHCl 3 extract of the aerial part of S. ramosissima possessed cytotoxic activity for several cancer cell lines. Herein we present for the first time results for the compositions of lipids and lipophilic substances in the aerial part of S. ramosissima and their cytotoxic activity for HL-60 and HeLa cells. Total lipids (TL) were extracted from the air-dried ground aerial part of the plant by CHCl 3 :MeOH according to Folch [9]. The resulting extract was worked up with aqueous CaCl 2 solution in order to remove non-lipid constituents. The yield of TL was 2.1 mass% of the air-dried raw material. They were dark-green and contained 197.3 mg% of chlorophyll pigments according to spectrophotometry. A part of the extract was separated by column chromatography (CC) over silica gel into separate lipid groups. Neutral lipids (NL) were eluted by CHCl 3 ; glycolipids (GL), by Me 2 CO; phospholipids (PL), by MeOH. Table 1 presents the yields. It can be seen that the GL yield was greater than half of the total lipid extract mass; NL, only a quarter; and PL, 12.4%. The qualitative compositions of the separate lipid groups were established using analytical TLC on silica gel and comparison with model samples isolated from natural sources, qualitative reactions, and literature data [10–12]. As a result, hydrocarbons, carotinoids, triacylglycerides, tocopherols, free fatty acids, and aliphatic and cyclic alcohols were detected in the NL using solvent systems 1–3. Mono- and digalactosyldiacylglycerides, sterylglycosides and their esters, among which sterylglycosides and their esters dominated, were identified in the GL using solvent system 4. The PL were analyzed by two- dimensional chromatography on silica gel using solvent systems 5 and 6. This revealed phosphatidylethanolamines, phosphatidylcholines, phosphatidylinositols, and phosphatidic acids. The principal constituents of this lipid group were phosphatidylcholines. 1) S. Yu. Yunusov Institute of the Chemistry of Plant Substances, Academy of Sciences of the Republic of Uzbekistan, Tashkent; e-mail: nigorayuldasheva@rambler.ru; 2) Department for Innovation in Biological, Agro-food and Forestal Systems, Laboratory of Plant Cytology and Biotechnology, Tuscia University, Largo dellUniversita, Blocco D, 01100 Viterbo, Italy. Translated from Khimiya Prirodnykh Soedinenii, No. 1, January–February, 2014, pp. 64–66. Original article submitted September 30, 2013.