Abstract
Eserine is an alkaloid extracted from Physostigma venenosum, which is a reversible acetylcholinesterase (AChE) inhibitor. Eserine is the same as acetylcholine, which can combine with cholinesterase, while AChE inhibitor will combine more tightly with cholinesterase, which leads to slow hydrolysis, inactive enzyme, cumulative ACh, and emergent biological activities. Eserine is employed clinically to treat glaucoma. Compared with pilocarpine, it is provided with shorter effective time and stronger effect; meanwhile it is more provocative and poorly tolerated, so it is most often used to locally treat acute glaucoma. For eserine is toxic, unstable, and unsafe, it is only used early in ophthalmology. With the expansion of its applications and the development of analytic techniques, researchers got over some barriers, and the studies about eserine were taken more seriously in recent years.
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© 2018 Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd. and People's Medical Publishing House, PR of China
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Lin, YH., Fang, LH., Du, GH. (2018). Eserine. In: Natural Small Molecule Drugs from Plants. Springer, Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-10-8022-7_41
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-10-8022-7_41
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