Background. Jinshuibao capsules (JSB) have been widely used to treat early diabetic nephropathy (DN), but the specific effects are still inconsistent. A meta‐analysis of randomized controlled trials (RCTs) was conducted to evaluate the clinical efficacy of JSB for early DN. Methods. Four international databases and four Chinese databases were searched from publication dates to March 1, 2018. The RCTs reporting the results of JSB’s specific effects were included, and comparisons were between JSB combined with Angiotensin Receptor Blockers (ARBs) as experimental intervention and ARBs as the control. Included studies’ quality was evaluated and the extracted data were analyzed with RevMan 5.3 software. Results. Twenty‐six RCTs including 2198 early DN participants were adopted in the meta‐analysis. The results showed that, compared with the ARBs alone, JSB could remarkably improve the ORR (OR = 3.84; 95% CI: 2.37~6.24; P < 0.00001) and decrease 24 h UTP (MD = −93.32; 95% CI: −128.60 ~−58.04; P < 0.00001), UAER (MD = −24.02; 95% CI: −30.93 ~−17.11; P < 0.00001), BUN (MD = −0.26; 95%: −0.44 ~−0.08; P = 0.005), Scr (MD = −9.07; 95% CI: −14.26 ~−3.88; P = 0.0006), ACR (MD = −17.55; 95% CI: −22.81 ~−12.29; P < 0.00001), Cys‐C (MD = −0.60; 95% CI: −0.88 ~−0.32; P < 0.00001), SBP (MD = −3.08; 95% CI: −4.65 ~−1.52; P = 0.0001), DBP (MD = −2.09; 95% CI: −4.00 ~−0.19; P = 0.03), and TG (MD = −0.36; 95% CI: −0.50 ~−0.21; P < 0.00001). However, it showed no significant differences in TC (MD = −0.32; 95% CI: −0.69~0.04; P = 0.08), FBG (MD = 0.04; 95% CI: −0.39~0.47; P = 0.87), HbA_1c (MD = −0.26; 95% CI: −0.59~0.06; P = 0.11), and β₂‐MG (MD = −15.61; 95% CI: −32.95~1.73; P = 0.08). Conclusions. This study indicates that JSB is an effective accessory therapeutic medicine for patients with early DN. It contributes to decreasing blood pressure and the content of triglyceride and improving the renal function of early DN patients. However, there is still a need to further verify the auxiliary therapeutic effect of JSB with more strictly designed RCTs with large sample and multiple centers in the future.

A novel method has been developed for rapid analysis of the major constituents in Radix Astragali and honey-processed Astragalus within 23 minutes using ultra-performance liquid chromatography coupled with electrospray ionization quadrupole time-of-flight mass spectrometry (UPLC/ESI-Q-TOF-MS). Separation analysis was performed on HSS T3 columns with a gradient elution of acetonitrile-water containing 0.1% formic acid at a flow rate of 0.3 mL min⁻¹. Methodology validation showed that the established method had good repeatability (RSD < 8.07%), intra-day precisions (RSD < 4.20%), and stability (RSD < 7.78%). Accurate molecular weight and characteristic fragment ions obtained from Q-TOF-MS provided a reliable criterion for the structural characterization of the major compounds in raw and honey-processed Astragalus. 35 major constituents, including flavonoids, isoflavan, pterocarpan, and saponins, were identified or tentatively characterized by comparing their retention times and MS spectra with those of authentic standards and literature data. Furthermore, quantitative analysis revealed that the content changes of chemical compositions could cause the tonic effect differences between raw and honey-processed Astragalus. The established method is rapid and reliable for simultaneous analysis of constituents in an extract of Radix Astragali. Moreover, this method will simplify further studies of metabolism and pharmacodynamics and will encourage the use of HSS T3 columns in similar traditional Chinese medicine research.

Targeting dendritic cells (DCs) metabolism-related pathways and in-situ activation of DCs have become a new trend in DC-based immunotherapy. Studies have shown that Lycium barbarum polysaccharide can promote DCs function. This study is aimed at exploring the mechanism of LBP affecting DCs function from the perspective of metabolomics. MTT method was used to detect the activity of DC2.4 cells. ELISA kit method was used to detect the contents of IL-6, IL-12, and TNF-α in the supernatant of cells. Ultra-performance liquid chromatography-quadrupole-time-of-flight mass spectrometry (UPLC-Q-TOF/MS) was used to detect general changes in DC2.4 cell metabolism. And then multidistance covariates and bioinformatics, partial least squares-discriminant analysis (PLS-DA) were used to analyze differential metabolites. Finally, metabolic pathway analysis was performed by MetaboAnalyst v5.0. The results showed that LBP had no significant inhibitory effect on the activity of DC2.4 cells at the experimental dose of 50-200μg/ml. LBP (100μg/ml) could significantly stimulate DC2.4 cells to secrete IL-6, TNF-α, and IL-12. Moreover, 20 differential metabolites could be identified, including betaine, hypoxanthine, L-carnitine, 5-methylthioadenosine, orotic acid, sphingomyelin, and L-glutamine. These metabolites were involved 28 metabolic pathways and the top 5 metabolic pathways were aspartate metabolism, pyrimidine metabolism, phenylacetate metabolism, methionine metabolism, and fatty acid metabolism. These results suggest that the effect of LBP on DCs function is related to the regulation of cell metabolism.