St. John’s Wort Extract

Introduction of St. John’s Wort Extract：

St. John’s Wort, also known as Forsythia suspensa, is a perennial deciduous shrub of Forsythia suspensa in Oleaceae. Its branches are brown, brown or yellowish brown, and its twigs are yellowish or grayish brown, slightly quadrangular, sparsely lenticellate, hollow internodes, and solid pith at the nodes. The leaves are usually simple, or 3-lobed to 3-lobed, and the leaves are ovate, broadly ovate, or elliptic ovate to elliptic. St. John’s Wort prefers warm, dry and well lit environments. It is cold and drought resistant, and can avoid floods.

Specification of  St. John’s Wort Extract

Benefits of St. John’s Wort Extract:

1. Microbial effect of disease resistance

As a broad-spectrum antibacterial agent, forsythia suspensa extract has a significant inhibitory effect on a variety of gram-positive and negative bacteria. For example, Forsythia suspensa decoction has inhibitory effect on pestis bacillus, human tuberculosis bacillus, proteus, diphtheria bacillus, staphylococcus aureus, typhoid bacillus, vibrio cholerae, pneumococcus, paratyphoid bacillus, Shigella dysenteriae, Shigella dysenteriae, Escherichia coli and hemolytic streptococcus; The water extract (1:5) has inhibitory effect on Nocardia stellatum. The main antibacterial active components of Forsythia suspensa are forsythiol, phillyrin and phillyrin. Forsythia suspensa can effectively inhibit FM1 strain of influenza A virus, and has therapeutic effect on chicken embryos infected with influenza virus;

2. Anti inflammatory effect

The aqueous solution of Forsythia suspensa ethanol extract injected intraperitoneally in rats has a very obvious anti exudative effect, and can enhance the vascular elasticity of the inflammatory site, but it cannot inhibit the formation of the inflammatory barrier.

3. Antipyretic effect

Forsythia suspensa decoction has obvious antipyretic effect on fever caused by Bacillus subtilis. Yinqiao Powder and Compound Forsythia Injection can also significantly inhibit experimental fever, promote its regression, and reduce the body temperature of normal animals. It is speculated that the cooling is central.

4. Impact on cardiovascular system

Single taste forsythia suspensa has obvious antagonism effect on cat shock caused by endotoxin by intravenous injection, and can keep blood pressure rising. This effect is related to enhancing myocardial contractility, increasing cardiac output, expanding blood vessels, improving capillary function and microcirculation. Forsythia suspensa extract has significant antihypertensive effect. Animal experiments have proved that the antihypertensive effect of forsythia suspensa extract is rapid and significant. Multiple injections of forsythia suspensa extract have no rapid tolerance, but the duration is short. Generally, the blood pressure can be reduced to about 50% of the original level. The rabbit ear perfusion experiment of Forsythia suspensa extract proved that the injection had a direct expansion effect on peripheral blood vessels. The mechanism of lowering blood pressure may be to expand the peripheral blood vessels to increase the body blood volume to achieve the purpose of lowering blood pressure.

5. Liver protection

Forsythia suspensa can obviously resist the experimental liver injury of rats caused by carbon tetrachloride, significantly reduce serum transaminase, reduce liver degeneration and necrosis, and promote the recovery of liver glycogen and ribonucleic acid content in liver cells.

6. Antiemetic effect

Forsythia suspensa has significant inhibitory effect on rat pica model established by apomorphine, copper sulfate and cisplatin.

7. Anti tumor effect

The chemical components in Forsythia suspensa may stimulate the body to produce tumor necrosis factor (TNF), which can be maintained at a certain level to play a role in inhibiting tumors and regulating the body’s immunity. Its anti-tumor mechanism may be due to promoting the proliferation and growth of immune cells to achieve anti-tumor effect, enhancing the cellular and humoral immune function to indirectly inhibit the growth of cancer cells in vivo, and inducing apoptosis of cancer cells through the expression of tumor suppressor factors. The ethanol extract of Forsythia suspensa has a good antagonistic effect on the primary malignant tumor cells in the pleural and peritoneal effusion, and compared with the chemotherapy drugs, it was found that the Forsythia suspensa extract still has a certain inhibitory effect on the chemotherapy resistant tumor cells.

Side effects, toxicity, and interactions for St. John’s Wort Extract:

Forsythia suspensa is a kind of Chinese herbal medicine with high medicinal value. Some people may have some gastrointestinal discomfort when taking Forsythia suspensa, such as nausea, vomiting, abdominal pain or diarrhea. During the treatment of diseases with Forsythia suspensa extract, a slight transient increase in serum aminotransferase may occur, and occasionally there are hepatotoxic symptoms, especially serious basic diseases, which may lead to abnormal renal function.