Background: It is known that beer accelerates gastrointestinal motility in humans. Our previous studies showed that beer congener stimulates gastrointestinal motility by directly stimulating the muscarinic M3 receptor. Further, we isolated 2 active compounds (compounds A and B) from beer by liquid chromatography. The objective of the present study was to identify the 2 active compounds that bind to the muscarinic M3 receptor in beer.
Methods: Structural analyses of the active compounds were performed by fast atom bombardment mass spectra, 1H-nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR), and 13C-NMR spectroscopy. Active compounds were chemically synthesized from p-coumaric acid and agmatine as starting materials. Binding activity to the muscarinic M3 receptor was used to confirm the activity of the synthetic compounds.
Results: It was identified that 2 active compounds had the same structural characteristics: stereoisomers (cis-isomer and trans-isomer), molecular weight=550 and molecular formula=C28H38N8O4. Trans-isomer (compound B) was identified as the known substance hordatine A, a kind of phytoalexin in barley, and cis-isomer (compound A) was found to be a novel compound (tentatively referred to as aperidine). Both naturally present and chemically synthesized aperidine (compound A) and hordatine A (compound B) were demonstrated to have potent binding activities to the muscarinic M3 receptor.
Conclusions: The 2 active compounds isolated from beer, namely aperidine (compound A) and hordatine A (compound B), have structurally and functionally been identified as active entities of binding to the muscarinic M3 receptor.