IntroductionStrychnos icaja roots are used in en:tral Africa for the preparation of arrow and ordeal poisons. Amongst the very numerous bases present in these roots, we have. isolated and identified six alkalo'ids. Apart from strychnine,we have obtained three alkaloids previously detected in the leaves: icajine, 19,20 a-epoxynovacine and 19,20 a-epoxy-15-hydroxynovacine. Moreover we have extracted dimeric alkaloids: symmetrical (bi~nordih~drotoxiferine) as well as a new unsymmetrical one (sungucine). Finally, it has been shown that the plant contained also various quaternary alkaloids and particularly Nb-methylstrychninium base which has been found for the first time. Phytochemical and pharmacological experiments are still under study. Le Strychnos icaja BAILLON est cklkbre par l'utilisation de ses racines rouges trks toxiques dans la prkparation de poisons de toutes sortes en Afrique Centrale [I]. Les feuilles et les fruits de cette plante ont ktk ktudiks par BISSET et al. qui en ont isolk 16 alcaloi'des monomkres [3-61. Par contre, les racines n'ont fait l'objet que d'une ktude sommaire, qui a cependant permis SAND-. BERG et al. d'isoler et' d'identifier la strychnine et la 12-hydro~ystr~chnine [7]. Les essais prkliminaires que nous avons alors rkalisCs sur les racines en notre possession ont fait apparattre une richesse alcaloi'dique peu commune (lOO/o de bases tertiaires et 2,5O/o de bases quaternaires) et la prksence de trks nombreux alcaloi'des [8]. Downloaded by: Universite Laval. Copyrighted material.
Strychnoxanthine, an anhydronium base, was isolated from root barks of STRYCHNOS GOSSWEILERI, a few years ago. The structure of this new indole alkaloid is now established by spectral analysis, especially by (1)H NMR at 360 MHz.
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