Discovery of natural polyphenols from the wild vegetable Suaeda salsa L. with potential cardioprotective functions

Suaeda salsa L. (Chenopodiaceae) is a wild vegetable distributed along the northern coast of China. Searching for potential agents with health benefits from S. salsa L. led to the identification of 14 flavonoids (1–14), eight phenolic acids (15–22), one coumarin (23), one benzoquinone (24), two sesquiterpenes (25, 26), and three lignins (27–29) from an aqueous ethanol (EtOH) extract of the above-ground whole plant using various column chromatographic methods. High-resolution electrospray ionization mass spectrometry (HRESIMS) analyses and nuclear magnetic resonance (1H and 13C NMR) spectroscopy were adopted to examine the structural properties of the compounds. To date, our study is the first to identify 20 compounds from this genus. Some compounds exhibited significant health benefits in zebrafish models. Compounds 2, 4, 23, and 28 significantly improved oxidative damage, while compounds 1–5, 7, 11, 13, 18, 19, and 23 significantly improved zebrafish lateral line neuromast inflammation. Additionally, compounds 1, 4, 8, 13, and 16 significantly promoted zebrafish angiogenesis, while compounds 3–5 and 18 significantly improved zebrafish arrhythmia. Furthermore, a flavonoid-targeted metabolomics study revealed that flavanone was the precursor of all of the flavonoids and had its highest accumulation in August, while the others showed their highest accumulation in September. Thus, the best time to harvest most of the bioactive polyphenols is during September. The present study revealed that the wild vegetable S. salsa L. might be developed as a potential cardioprotective functional food.