Arjunolic acid  from Terminalia arjuna herb

Streptozotocin induced activation of oxidative stress responsive splenic cell signaling pathways: Protective role of arjunolic acid.
Toxicol Appl Pharmacol. 2010 Jan 4. Manna P, Ghosh J, Das J, Sil PC. Division of Molecular Medicine, Bose Institute, P-1/12, CIT Scheme VIIM, Calcutta-700054, West Bengal, India.
Present study investigates the beneficial role of arjunolic acid against the alteration in the cytokine levels and simultaneous activation of oxidative stress responsive signaling pathways in spleen under hyperglycemic condition. Diabetes was induced by injection of streptozotocin (STZ). Histological examination revealed that diabetic induction depleted the white pulp scoring which is in agreement with the reduced immunological response. Treatment with arjunolic acid prevented the hyperglycemia and its associated pathogenesis in spleen tissue. Results suggest that arjunolic acid might act as an anti-diabetic and immunomodulatory agent against hyperglycemia.

Self-Assembly of Esters of Arjunolic Acid into Fibrous Networks and the Properties of their Organogels (dagger).
Langmuir. 2009 Apr 24. Bag BG, Dinda SK, Dey PP, Mallia VA, Weiss RG. Department of Chemistry and Chemical Technology, Vidyasagar University, Midnapore 721 102, WB, India.
Nine esters of a naturally occurring triterpenoid, arjunolic acid, with alkyl chains have been synthesized, and their self-assembly has been studied in organic liquids. All of the esters examined were found to be excellent gelators. No birefringence was detected in optical micrographs of the transparent toluene gels with 5% (w/w) ethyl arjunolate or 5% (w/w) p-nitrobenzyl arjunolate as the gelator, but a spherulitic-type pattern was seen for a gel of 1.2% (w/w) p-nitrobenzyl arjunolate in 1/1 (w/w) chloroform/cyclohexane. Electron microscope images revealed self-assembled fibrillar network (SAFIN) structures with right-handed helical ribbons in some gels. With increasing concentration of the gelators, the gel-to-sol transition temperature (T(gel)) increased and then approached plateau values. Differential scanning thermograms demonstrated that the heats for transition from transparent gels to sols of ethyl arjunolate or p-nitrobenzyl arjunolate in toluene are very small. Powder X-ray diffractograms revealed that the molecular packing in the SAFIN of the 5% (w/w) ethyl arjunoate in the toluene gel was amorphous and similar to the diffractogram recorded for the neat gelator. Although the diffractogram of neat p-nitrobenzyl arjunolate consisted of broad peaks, suggesting disordered packing, the low-angle peaks of the corresponding toluene gel were much sharper; these results indicate more crystalline packing in the SAFIN than in the neat gelator. The kinetics and growth of the transformation of sols of p-nitrobenzyl arjunolate in 1/1 (w/w) chloroform/cyclohexane to their gels have been investigated at different incubation temperatures by circular dichroism spectroscopy. The data have been analyzed to probe the mechanism of SAFIN formation and the relationship between the molecular structures of the esters of arjunolic acid and their abilities to function as gelators of a wide variety of organic liquids.