Isolation of macrocarpene-type sesquiterpenes from stigma maydis with neuroprotective activities

Five undescribed macrocarpene-type sesquiterpenes (1–5), along with a known analogue (6) were isolated from the crude extract of stigma maydis. The structures of these compounds were elucidated based on comprehensive spectroscopic analyses together with quantum chemical calculations of 13C NMR data and electronic circular dichroism (ECD) curves. All isolated compounds were tested for their neuroprotective effects against the injury of human neuroblastoma SH-SY5Y cells induced by H2O2. Among them, compounds 3 (65.89%) and 5 (64.38%) showed moderate neuroprotective activity at 50 μM.