A triterpenoid saponin with diverse biological activities; selectively inhibits human recombinant renin and porcine kidney renin (IC50s = 30 and 30 μg/ml, respectively) over bovine trypsin, human urinary kallikrein, and rabbit ACE at 0.1 μg/ml; inhibits mouse brain ST3GAL1 (Ki = 2.1 μM) and decreases levels of α2,3-linked sialic acid on the cell surface and decreases migration of B16/F10 mouse melanoma cells in vitro at 75 μM; dose-dependently increases viability and mRNA expression in BRL 3A immortalized rat hepatocytes subjected to alcohol-induced oxidative stress; increases the latency to enter the dark chamber in a passive avoidance test and the percentage of spontaneous alterations in the Y-maze test in an ibotenic acid-induced rat model of learning and memory impairment at 10 mg/kg per day