Secondary metabolites from lichen as potent inhibitors of advanced glycation end products and vasodilative agents

Secondary metabolites from lichens are known for exhibiting various biological effects such as anti-inflammatory, antioxidant and antibacterial activities. Despite this wide range of reported biological effects, their impact on the formation of advanced glycation end products (AGEs) remains vastly unexplored. The latter are known contributors to lifestyle and age-related diseases such as Alzheimer and Parkinson. Moreover, the development of atherosclerosis and arterial stiffness is causally linked to the formation of AGEs. With this in mind, the present work evaluated the inhibitory effects of secondary lichen metabolites on the formation of pentosidine-like AGEs by using an in vitro, Maillard reaction based, fluorescence assay. Overall, thirty-seven natural and five synthetically modified compounds were tested, eighteen of which exhibiting IC50 values in the range of 0.05 to 0.70 mM, which corresponds to 2 to 32 fold of the inhibitory activity of aminoguanidine. In addition, all compounds were evaluated on their radical scavenging capacities in an DPPH assay targeting one major inhibiting mechanism of AGEs formation. Furthermore, as both AGEs\u27 formation and hypertension are major risk factors for atherosclerosis, compounds that were available in sufficient amounts were also tested for their vasodilative effects. Although some of the active compounds were previously reported cytotoxic, present results highlight the interesting potential of secondary lichen metabolites as anti-AGE and vasodilative agents