| Areca nut is a fruit of Areca cathchu Linn., one of the palm species, and is the most commonly used drug in the world after tobacco, ethanol and caffeine. In China, it is widely used in clinical medicine as a common herbal medicine while in some areas as Hunan province, it's extremely prevalent to chew processed commercial areca nut. Therefore, it's important to evaluate the physiological & hygienical effect of areca nut extracts (ANE) deeply and systematically.In this study, we used the areca nut from Hainan as the raw material. After extracted with 70% aqueous-methanol and condensed, the areca nut crude extract (A) was produced and then in turn, we used the petroleum ether, chloroform and ethyl acetate to treat the crude extract, and different solvent extracts were received, including the petroleum ether fraction (B), the chloroform fraction (C), the ehhyl acetate fraction (D) and the aqueous fraction (E). In this investigation, we conducted the functional evaluation of areca nut extracts through their effects on the gastrointestinal function in mice, their in vivo antimicrobial effects in mice, their hyperlipaemia-moderating effects in rats and in vivo anti-oxidative effects in mice. The main results were shown as follow:The effect of ANE on the gastrointestinal function in mice was studied through conducting the laxative activity experiment, charcoal meal gastrointestinal transit test and the alvine absorption test. The result showed all of the extracts had effects on the gastrointestinal function in mice. Using the alvine transit rate and alvine absorption as the evaluation indexes, we found that A, D and E had better effects, and the dosages were focused on the middle and high concentrations. This may due to the areca-specified alkaloids and some of the polar constitutes in the nut.The in vivo antimicrobial effects of five ANE in mice was studied and the results showed that different extracts had different antibacterial effects, and the effect of E was the best, followed with A and D, whose mortality rates were 27.3%,30.0% and 40.0% in the high concentration (50 mg/kg), respectively, and meanwhile, the three better testing samples all showed a dose-effect relationship.The function of moderating hyperlipaemia of A and E extracts in rats were evaluated by the indexes of the weight-gaining, serum TC, TG, HDL-C concentrations and AI, et al. The results showed that A and E both could significantly reduce the serum TC, TG concentrations and AI (p<0.001), and could obviously promote the serum HDL-C concentration of the animals (p<0.05). This implied that ANE could decrease the incidence of death by coronary artery disease as well as total morbidity for hyperlipidemic subjects through lowering plasma TC and TG concentrations.In vitro study, we found that A, D and E had better effect on scavenging the·OH free radical. In vivo, we studied the anti-oxidative effect in mice by testing the serum SOD and MDA concentrations, and the results showed that the 3 testing samples all had effects on the anti-oxidative effect in mice. Take the serum SOD concentration as index, E was the best, followed with D and A was the last, the regularity remained the same as that of in the·OH free radical scavenging test; when it came to the serum MDA concentration, E was still the best, followed with A and D was the last. This suggested that ANE possessed potent anti-oxidative characteristics, which could be due to certain polar substances (mainly phenolic compounds) rather than to non-polar substances.Through performing the maximal tolerance dose test and acute toxicity test of ANE, we found that the 5 testing samples made some differences in the effects on the behaviour of mice; the toxicity of A, B and D were low, whose maximal safety tolerance multiple all exceeded 157; the toxicity of C and E were high relatively, and their 50% lethal dose were 6.84 and 5.85 g/kg, respectively, this explained that the areca-alkaloids had certain toxicity. On the whole, under the common use, the toxicity of areca nut was very low, and could be ignored nearly.We could draw the conclusion from this investigation that ANE had several physiological and hygienical functions such as improve the gastrointestinal function and facilitate the alvine absorption, moderating hyperlipaemia, in vivo anti-oxidative and anti-bacterial. As the toxicity of ANE is low, it's safe to consume areca nut commonly.
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