Bioactive Glycosides from the Twigs of <i>Litsea cubeba</i>

The air-dried twigs of <i>Litsea cubeba,</i> a traditional Chinese medicinal tree, afforded 10 new aromatic glycosides (<b>1</b>–<b>10</b>) and 26 known analogues. Their structures were assigned by extensive 1D and 2D NMR experiments, and the absolute configurations were resolved by chemical methods, electronic circular dichroism, specific rotation, and X-ray crystallographic analysis. Compound <b>4</b> is the first example of a naturally occurring homoneolignan glucoside. Compounds <b>4</b>, <b>6</b>–<b>8</b>, and the known neolignan glucosides (<b>11</b>, <b>12</b>, and <b>14</b>) at respective 10 μM concentrations were found to reduce acetaminophen-induced HepG2 cell injury with 30.5–46.0% inhibitions. Furthermore, compounds <b>12</b> and <b>15</b> demonstrated moderate inhibitory activities against HDAC1, with IC₅₀ values of 3.6 and 4.6 μM, respectively