Main antimicrobial components of Tinospora capillipes, and their mode of action against Staphylococcus aureus.

In this investigation, the antibacterial modes of action of Radix Tinosporae, its major single components, and nine antibiotics with different targets or modes-of-action on Staphylococcus aureus were studied. Metabolic profiles of cultures treated with different medicines were acquired by HPLC/ESI-MS. After HPLC-MS data pretreatment, those profiles acquired were reduced into several MS vectors. Then statistical processing by principal components analysis was carried out upon those vectors, two conclusions could be drawn: (1) the antibacterial mode of action of Radix Tinosporae is similar to that of rifampicin and norfloxacin, which act on nucleic acid; (2) its active components playing main antimicrobial roles on Staphylococcus aureus might be alkaloids, such as palmatine and jatrorrhizine.