International Journal of Phytomedicine and Phytotherapy
From: Diosgenin and galactomannans, natural products in the pharmaceutical sciences
Health benefits | Key points | Reference |
---|---|---|
Anti-diabetic effects | a. Diosgenin could have a beneficial role against aortic damage induced by oxidative stress in diabetic state. | |
 | b. Diosgenin demonstrated anti-glycating properties and it improved the renal function in diabetic rats. |  |
 | c. Diosgenin can effectively regulate the related targets and pathways of glycolipid metabolism, apoptosis, inflammation and oxidative stress to improve diabetes and it complications. | [70] |
 | d. Diosgenin counteracted the effect of diabetes on the growth plate and cancellous bone microarchitecture in the distal femur, indicating some limited beneficial impact on the skeleton. | [71] |
Anti-inflammatory activity | a. Diosgenin modulates adipokine expression in perivascular adipose tissue (PVAT) against inflammation which depends on AMPK. | |
 | b. Diosgenin down-regulated the inflammatory mediators which prevent the atherosclerotic disease progression and concomitant suppression of inflammatory mediators in liver and brain. | [74] |
Anti-Obesity effects | a. Dioscin and its aglycone, diosgenin, both suppressed the time-dependent increase of blood triacylglycerol level when orally injected with corn oil to mice, which shows their inhibitory potential against fat absorption. | [75] |
Anti-oxidant effects | a. Diosgenin with antioxidant function may show potential to improve cardiac tissue abnormalities. | [76] |
 | b. Diosgenin shows concentration dependent antioxidant potential. | |
Anti-proliferative effects | a. The azasteroidal compounds from diosgenin showed lower cytotoxicity and lactam-type enamide derivative showed activity in cancer cell line MDA-MB-231. | [79] |
Anti-psoriasis effects | a. In animal studies, diosgenin attenuated psoriatic lesions on mice by inhibiting vascular formation partially by reducing the VEGF-α expression in keratinocytes. | [80] |
 | b. Diosgenin down-regulated pro-inflammatory cytokines through TLR4/Myd88 inhibition and up-regulated several differentiation markers, expression in HaCaT cells. | [80] |
Anti-cancer effects | a. Diosgenin is a novel blocker of the STAT3 activation pathway, with a potential role in the treatment of hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) and other cancers. | |
 | b. Diosgenin has shown inhibitory activity on human breast cancer MDA-MB-231 cell migration, and inhibited action polymerization, Vav2 phosphorylation and Cdc42 activation which shows its therapeutic potential for human breast cancer metastasis therapy. | [83] |
 | c. Inhibition of Enhancer of zeste homo-log2 (EZH2) by diosgenin could be a promising therapeutic method for pancreatic cancer (PC) treatment as EZH2 signaling is closely associated with the anti-tumor characteristics of diosgenin in PC cells. | [84] |
 | e. Diosgenin and its glycosidic derivatives are promising anti-cancer compounds as they are compounds with low necrotic activity and selective action. | |
Anti-tumour effects | a. A set of diosgenin compounds should be considered as a promising scaffold for their abilities as anticancer and immunomodulatory agents. | |
Hepatoprotective effects | a. Administration of diosgenin may lead to reduction of liver injury indices and oxidative stress and inflammatory events. | [89] |
Improve female reproduction | a. Phytoestrogen diosgenin promotes basic ovarian cell functions (proliferation, apoptosis, steroid, and peptide hormone release). | [90] |
Multipe sclerosis | a. Diosgenin alleviated the progression of experimental autoimmune encephalomyelitis with reduction in central nervous system inflammation and demyelination. | [91] |
Skin aging | a. A restoration of keratinocyte proliferation in aged skin, showed that diosgenin may have potential to be considered as a safe health food for climacteric. | [92] |
Wound healing | a. Genipin crosslinked gelatin/diosgenin-nanocellulose hydrogels showed excellent antibacterial effect towards Gram + and – bacteria, and it is suitable in wound healing. | [93] |