pharmaceutics Article Lack of Correlation between In Vitro and In Vivo Studies on the Inhibitory Effects of (-)-Sophoranone on CYP2C9 Is Attributable to Low Oral Absorption and Extensive Plasma Protein Binding of (-)-Sophoranone 1, 2,3, 3 3 3 Yu Fen Zheng y, Soo Hyeon Bae y , Zhouchi Huang , Soon Uk Chae , Seong Jun Jo , Hyung Joon Shim 3, Chae Bin Lee 3, Doyun Kim 3,4, Hunseung Yoo 4 and Soo Kyung Bae 3,* 1 School of Basic Medicine and Clinical Pharmacy, China Pharmaceutical University, 639 Longmian Road, Jiangning District, Nanjing 211198, China;
[email protected] 2 Q-fitter, Inc., Seoul 06578, Korea; sh.bae@qfitter.com 3 College of Pharmacy and Integrated Research Institute of Pharmaceutical Sciences, The Catholic University, Korea, Bucheon 14662, Korea;
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[email protected]; Tel.: +82-2-2164-4054 These authors contributed equally to this work. y Received: 8 March 2020; Accepted: 5 April 2020; Published: 7 April 2020 Abstract: (-)-Sophoranone (SPN) is a bioactive component of Sophora tonkinensis with various pharmacological activities. This study aims to evaluate its in vitro and in vivo inhibitory potential against the nine major CYP enzymes. Of the nine tested CYPs, it exerted the strongest inhibitory effect on CYP2C9-mediated tolbutamide 4-hydroxylation with the lowest IC50 (Ki) value of 0.966 0.149 µM (0.503 0.0383 µM), in a competitive manner.