Yukihiro Shoyama
Nagasaki International University, Japan
Title: Licorice constituents activate the in vitro fertilization
Biography
Biography: Yukihiro Shoyama
Abstract
Licorice is one of the most important natural products from time immemorial and until now since it has various pharmacological activities depending on five hundred or more constituents. Among them glycyrrhizin is the most popular active compound having many pharmacological activities and developed as a medicine for liver diseases and allergy in Japan. Therefore, we first prepared monoclonal antibodies against glycyrrhizin with a major flavonoid, liquiritin and set up the ELISA system for qualitative and/or quantitative analysis, and developed a new immunostaining system, eastern blotting. Under the survey of active components in licorice using immuno-chemical assay system developed, we found that the licorice extract can accelerate the in vitro fertilization of mice. The ethyl acetate fraction from the crude extract indicated most active resulting in the isolation and identification of two active components, hormononetin and isoliquiritigenin. We confirmed that the addition of them in the medium promoted the in vitro fertilization resulting in birth, and that the active components were incorporated into the sperm activating the sperm movement. The active echanism will be also discussed in this congress.