What is Cepharanthine?

  Recently, the new crown treatment drug discovered by Chinese scientists has been authorized by the national invention patent. The patent specification shows that 10um (micromol / L) stephanine inhibits coronavirus replication by 15393 times. Professor tongyigang, the inventor of the patent and Dean of the school of life science and technology of Beijing University of chemical technology, said that from the current research data, the ability of the drug to inhibit novel coronavirus ranked high among all novel coronavirus inhibitors found by humans.

  Cepharanthine, a white blood cell proliferation drug, can promote the proliferation of bone marrow tissue and increase white blood cells. For leukopenia. It can increase leukocytes in peripheral blood. Animal experiments have found that it can significantly prevent leukopenia caused by mitomycin, but does not inhibit the anticancer effect of mitomycin. Its mechanism is to promote the proliferation of bone marrow tissue, resulting in the increase of leukocytes. It is used for agranulocytosis caused by tumor chemotherapy and radiotherapy and leukopenia caused by other reasons.

What is Cepharanthine?

  Stephanine, also known as stephanine base,English name is Cepharanthine, its molecular formula C₃₇H₃₈N₅O₆.

  Stephanine is really not a newly developed drug. It was first extracted from Stephania tenuifolia by Japanese pharmacist Saburo Fujiwara in 1934. Stephanine has been used clinically for decades. It is a prescription drug. It was first used in anti tuberculosis treatment, and the effect was very general. However, it was found that the leukocytes of many patients increased significantly during the treatment, so later researchers tried to use stephanine in the treatment of leukopenia, especially in the process of anti-tumor (such as radiotherapy and chemotherapy), which is the main clinical use of stephanine at present. It can promote the proliferation of bone marrow tissue and increase leukocytes. It is mainly used for neutropenia caused by tumor chemotherapy and radiotherapy and leukopenia caused by other reasons. According to chemical encyclopedia, at present, the main raw material for the manufacture of stephanine is ground root powder. But it can be completely chemically synthesized.

   In January, 2020, after the outbreak of COVID-19, the anti Xinguan drugs were screened out. Professor Tong Yigang, Dean of the school of life science and technology of Beijing University of chemical technology, screened thousands of drugs in the laboratory, and finally got several effective drugs, among which the most effective is stephanine. Subsequently, institutional experiments in the United States and Japan found that stephanine is better than other drugs in the treatment of Xinguan, which is the most effective drug known at present.