Showing papers in "Natural Product Communications in 2007"
TL;DR: The structures, biological activity, synthesis and biosynthesis of crucifer phytoalexins are reviewed in this paper, where the authors present an overview of the main steps of the process.
Abstract: The structures, biological activity, synthesis and biosynthesis of crucifer phytoalexins are reviewed.
50 citations
TL;DR: The leaf essential oils of twenty-three species of Lauraceae from Monteverde, Costa Rica, have been screened for inhibition of the cysteine protease cruzain and showed promising and marginal activity, respectively.
Abstract: The leaf essential oils of twenty-three species of Lauraceae from Monteverde, Costa Rica, have been screened for inhibition of the cysteine protease cruzain. Of these, nine showed promising cruzain...
49 citations
TL;DR: The leaf essential oils of Beilschmiedia sp.
Abstract: The leaf essential oils of Beilschmiedia sp. nov. “chancho blanco”, Cinnamomum costaricanum, Ocotea meziana, Ocotea sp. nov. “los llanos” and Ocotea sp. nov. “small leaf” showed notable in-vitro cy...
48 citations
TL;DR: This paper briefly reviews some of the more recent data and identifies areas that require standardization and further study in volatile components of essential oils.
Abstract: Interest in the antifungal activity of essential oils has increased markedly in recent years. The volatile (vapour) components of several essential oils have been demonstrated to have potent antifu...
47 citations
TL;DR: Essential oils from Calyptranthes pittieri, Cinnamomum tonduzii, Croton niveus and C. monteverdensis, and Zanthoxylum sp.
Abstract: Essential oils from Calyptranthes pittieri (Lauraceae), Cinnamomum tonduzii (Lauraceae), Croton niveus and C. monteverdensis (Euphorbiaceae), Dendropanax arboreus (Araliaceae), Eugenia austin-smith...
46 citations
TL;DR: The role of essential oil compounds that are produced by flowers as chemical attractants used to draw in their often highly-specific pollinators are focused on.
Abstract: Pollination is an essential biological process in higher plant reproduction that involves the transfer of pollen to the female sexual organs of flowers or cones. It plays a critical role in the rep...
44 citations
Journal Article•
42 citations
TL;DR: The present work revealed that these plants are rich in monoterpenoids, which suggest a suitable strategy for pest management of stored products.
Abstract: Essential oils of aromatic plants with insecticidal properties are nowadays considered as alternative insecticides to protect stored products from attack by insect pests. A combination of some of these plants in the granaries is a current practice in certain localities of northern Cameroon. The aim of the present work was to analyze the impact of the combinations of the essential oils of Vepris heterophylla (Rutaceae), Ocimum canum, and Hyptis spicigera (both Lamiaceae), the three most used local aromatic plants because of their insecticidal activity and their repellent effect on Sitophilus oryzae. The present work revealed that these plants are rich in monoterpenoids. The GC/MS analyses have shown that monoterpenoids represented 65.5% for H. spicigera, 92.1% for O. canum and 47.0% for V. heterophylla. The crude essential oil of O. canum was the most insecticidal with a LD50 of 42.9 ppm. The most repellent effect was obtained by a combination of the essential oils of H. spicigera and O. canum, with a repellent percentage at 77.5%. These results suggest a suitable strategy for pest management of stored products.
42 citations
TL;DR: Pediococcus acidilactici LAB 5 produces antifungal compound(s), as well as bacteriocin, which was isolated from vacuum packed fermented meat, which showed a great degree of media specificity and it was strictly restricted to MRS agar media.
Abstract: Pediococcus acidilactici LAB 5 produces antifungal compound(s), as well as bacteriocin, which was isolated from vacuum packed fermented meat. This bacterium exhibits varying degrees of antifungal a...
41 citations
TL;DR: Phylogenetic analysis showed that both CsTPSs group within the angiosperms and belong to the Tpsb subgroup of monoterpene synthases, which were detected as natural products in C. sativa trichomes.
Abstract: Two recombinant, stereospecific monoterpene synthases, a (-)-limonene synthase (CsTPS1) and a (+)-α-pinene synthase (CsTPS2), encoded by Cannabis sativa L. cv. ‘Skunk’ trichome mRNA, have been isol...
40 citations
TL;DR: The results provide a rationale for the use ofCatnip, lemon catnip and lemon balm oils in the complementary topical treatment of respiratory tract infections, as the oils show a high antibacterial activity against respiratory tract pathogens, including clinical isolates with reduced susceptibility to standard antibiotics.
Abstract: The aim of the present study was to investigate the susceptibility of bacteria that play a role in respiratory tract and skin infections to the essential oils of catnip (Nepeta cataria), lemon catn...
TL;DR: The present review describes and discusses the chemistry and chemotaxonomic implications, as well as hypothetical biogenetic considerations, of the essential oils isolated from 23 taxa of Balkan Achillea using multivariate statistical analysis.
Abstract: The present review describes and discusses the chemistry and chemotaxonomic implications, as well as hypothetical biogenetic considerations, of the essential oils isolated from 23 taxa of Balkan Ac...
TL;DR: A novel dimeric melampolide was isolated from the leaf rinse extract of Smallanthus sonchifolius, an Andean medicinal plant popularly known as yacón, and its anti-inflammatory properties were assessed in vitro by analyzing its effect on the DNA binding of the transcription factor NF-κB.
Abstract: A novel dimeric melampolide was isolated from the leaf rinse extract of Smallanthus sonchifolius (Poepp. & Endl.) H. Robinson (Asteraceae), an Andean medicinal plant popularly known as yacon. Dimer...
TL;DR: With the current view that botanical drugs can be developed faster and more cheaply than conventional single entity pharmaceuticals, the review mainly focuses on the rationality of their use with appropriate literature data support.
Abstract: Obesity has reached epidemic proportions globally, with more than 1 billion adults overweight - at least 300 million of them clinically obese. In Ayurveda, obesity is called ‘medoroga’. The detaile...
TL;DR: The synthesis and evaluation of stilbene-based resveratrol analogues proved to be a highly active field of research and has recently afforded compounds with either cytotoxic or pro-apoptotic activity in the nanomolar range.
Abstract: Recent literature about stilbene-based analogues of resveratrol (1) has been reviewed, and a total of 94 compounds are reported (see structures 4 – 97), selected either for their promising anti-tum...
TL;DR: The stems of Cissus quadrangularis L (Vitaceae) have been consumed for centuries throughout Asia and Africa as a culinary vegetable as discussed by the authors, and the aqueous extract of C. quadrinangularis stems and leaves contai...
Abstract: The stems of Cissus quadrangularis L (Vitaceae) have been consumed for centuries throughout Asia and Africa as a culinary vegetable. The aqueous extract of C. quadrangularis stems and leaves contai...
TL;DR: This review takes note of the recent revision of plant families that were known to contain HIFs that have now been merged into one big family, Asparagaceae, and contains their structures, biological sources, plant parts they are obtained from, and, if reported, their optical rotations and melting points.
Abstract: This review documents all the new homoisoflavonoids (HIFs) that have been reported since 2007, whose total number has grown from 159 in 2007 to 295 at the present time. This review contains their s...
TL;DR: The leaf essential oils of five species of Beilschmiedia from Monteverde, Costa Rica have been obtained by hydrodistillation and analyzed by GC-MS in order to discern the differences and similarities between the volatile chemical compositions of these species.
Abstract: The leaf essential oils of five species of Beilschmiedia from Monteverde, Costa Rica (Beilschmiedia alloiophylla, B. brenesii, B. costaricensis, B. tilaranensis, and an undescribed Beilschmiedia species “chancho blanco”) have been obtained by hydrodistillation and analyzed by GC-MS in order to discern the differences and similarities between the volatile chemical compositions of these species. The principal constituents of B. alloiophylla leaf oil were germacrene D (18.9%), cis- and trans-β-ocimene (18.8% and 9.3%, respectively), α-pinene (11.8%), and bicyclogermacrene (9.1%). The leaf oil of B. brenesii was composed largely of the sesquiterpenes germacrene D (19.3%), β-caryophyllene (13.4%), α-copaene (9.0%), α-humulene (8.1%), and δ-cadinene (5.8%), and the carbonyl compounds 2-undecanone (12.8%), trans-2-hexenal (8.8%), and 2-tridecanone (3.8%). α-Bisabolol (72.1%) dominated the leaf oil of B. costaricensis, while B. tilaranensis had germacrene D (54.9%), β-caryophyllene (14.8%), and δ-cadinene (5.1%) as major components. Beilschmiedia “chancho blanco” leaf oil was composed largely of β-caryophyllene (16.6%), bicyclogermacrene (14.1%), and α-pinene (12.1%).
TL;DR: The composition of the essential oils of the umbels and fruit of Prangos uloptera, an indigenous Iranian medicinal plant, was determined by GC-MS analyses by identifying 10 and 18 compounds that represented, respectively, 93.2 and 83.0% of the total essential oils.
Abstract: The composition of the essential oils of the umbels and fruit of Prangos uloptera, an indigenous Iranian medicinal plant, was determined by GC-MS analyses. A total of 10 and 18 compounds were ident...
TL;DR: It is demonstrated that chicory extracts rich in sesquiterpene lactones have potent anti-inflammatory activity with potential therapeutic use.
Abstract: A chicory root extract rich in sesquiterpene lactones significantly reduced inflammation in two animal models In a rat paw edema model, chicory extract at 50 and 100 mg/kg significantly reduced in
TL;DR: Results obtained in the present study indicate the possibility of exploiting C. zeylanicum essential oil to prevent diseases such as diabetes and cancer, to slow down ageing, and also to combat strains of A. flavus and Fusarium moniliforme responsible for biodeterioration of stored food products.
Abstract: The aim of the present study was to investigate the essential oil of Cinnamomum zeylanicum from Cameroon for its chemical composition, antiradical and antifungal activities against some common fung...
TL;DR: Croton draco bark essential oil has been shown to inhibit the activity of cruzain and is tested for cytotoxic activity against a panel of human tumor cell lines, but shows little activity.
Abstract: American trypanosomiasis, Chagas disease, is a great cause of human morbidity and mortality in the Neotropics. Although there is currently no effective treatment for this parasitic disease, a numbe...
TL;DR: In this article, an innovative tool in GC-MS peak assignment procedures is described, besides considering the conventional spectra similarity matching, Linear Retention Indices are used as filters for enhancing rel...
Abstract: An innovative tool in GC-MS peak assignment procedures is described. Besides considering the conventional spectra similarity matching, Linear Retention Indices are used as filters for enhancing rel...
TL;DR: These rare and interesting compounds were, for the first time, isolated and identified from Iranian Salvia species by the senior author and their NMR spectroscopic data are briefly reviewed.
Abstract: Apart from their common constituents (terpenoids and flavonoids) and their interesting biological activities, the genus Salvia is unusual as it is the only genus in the Labiatae that contains seste...
TL;DR: This review is an attempt to summarize the available information on A. paniculata for further investigation and is known to have very low toxicity in animals and humans.
Abstract: Andrographis paniculata (Burma f.) Wall ex Nees (Acanthaceae) is a common weed distributed throughout the tropical and subtropical regions. All parts of A. paniculata are extremely bitter in taste....
TL;DR: The results suggest that most of the characteristic constituents of subfamily Hypoxyloideae (i.e. Hypoxylon and related genera) are involved in non-specific defense reactions that underwent specific permutations in the course of evolutionary processes, resulting in a broad diversity of unique polyketides and other secondary metabolites.
Abstract: Fruiting bodies collected in the field during the vegetation period in different developmental stages and mycelial cultures of 50 representatives of xylariaceous fungi were tested for antimicrobial...
TL;DR: A further enzymatic step had to be added to the morphine pathway in the poppy plant, involved in the transformation of 2 moles L-tyrosine to one mole of morphine.
Abstract: Along the poppy morphine biosynthetic pathway, the transition from salutaridinol-7-O-acetate to thebaine had previously been claimed to proceed non-enzymatically between pH 8–9. At pH 6–7, the acetate was transformed to an azonine derivative. These transformation reactions were revisited using Papaver somniferum protein extracts in search for a possible protein catalyst. After removal of residues and inhibitory low molecular weight compounds from the latex of P. somniferum, this latex serum was shown to convert salutaridinol-7-O-acetate to thebaine in high yield at the physiological pH of 7.0. A new enzyme, which was partly purified, was shown to catalyze this reaction and was partly characterized. As a result, a further enzymatic step had to be added to the morphine pathway in the poppy plant, involved in the transformation of 2 moles L-tyrosine to one mole of morphine.
TL;DR: This review describes the principles and performance of a number of hyphenated techniques involving LC-MS that can be used for dereplication of natural products for rapid lead identification.
Abstract: Natural products are the most consistently successful source of drug leads. The rapid identification of known compounds from natural product extracts, or ‘dereplication’, is an important step in an...
TL;DR: The leaf essential oils of Eugenia cartagensis, Myrcia sp.
Abstract: The leaf essential oils of Eugenia cartagensis, Myrcia sp. nov. “fuzzy leaf”, Ocotea veraguensis, O. whitei, and Persea americana, have been obtained by hydrodistillation and the essential oil comp...
TL;DR: The low dose antibacterial activity observed in this investigation suggested that the essential oil of L. oreganoides could be used in pharmaceutical preparations for the treatment of infections caused by multiresistant bacteria.
Abstract: Antibacterial activity of the essential oil of Lippia oreganoides was evaluated against thirty-nine multiresistant bacterial strains of nosocomial origin and five reference bacterial strains using the disk diffusion agar method. The results obtained have revealed strong antibacterial activity against methicillin resistant Staphylococcus aureus, extended spectrum β-lactamase producing Klebsiella pneumoniae, and multiresistant Acinetobacter baumannii with MIC values ranging from 20 to 40 μg/mL. The low dose antibacterial activity observed in this investigation suggested that the essential oil of L. oreganoides could be used in pharmaceutical preparations for the treatment of infections caused by multiresistant bacteria. According to the literature consulted, this is the first time that antibacterial activity of this species against multiresistant bacterial strains of nosocomial origin has been reported.