Four New Depsides Isolated from Salvia miltiorrhiza and Their Significant Nerve-Protective Activities.

By investigating of the roots of Salvia miltiorrhiza , which is one of the most widely used Chinese herbs, we used phytochemical methods successfully to obtain twelve depsides: four depsides ( 1 ⁻ 4 ) that were previously undescribed, along with eight known ones ( 5 ⁻ 12 ). Their structure characteristics were assessed by HR-ESIMS, CD, NMR (¹H, 13 C, HSQC, HMBC) data analyses. These four newly isolated compounds ( 1 ⁻ 4 ), as well as the other eight compounds ( 5 ⁻ 12 ), show extraordinary protective effects on hydrogen peroxide-induced apoptosis in HS-SY5Y cells. Among them, depside 4 and depside 6 displayed more obviously protective effects than others.