A Modern Look at Folkloric Use of Anti-infective Agents

Abstract

Infectious diseases are of ancient origin, and mankind has a venerable history of use of higher plant extracts for the therapy of such infections. Some such agents survive in use from earlier times--quinine, emetine, and sanguinarine, for example--but the modern use of fermentation-based antibiotics has greatly overshadowed work on agents from other sources. After a brief review of the present status of the field of antibiotics, this review focuses upon the present status of antimicrobial agents from higher plants with particular reference to agents from plants with a folkloric reputation for treatment of infections. In particular, recent work on the tropical genus Erythrina is emphasized. The use of modern microbiological techniques demonstrates that higher plants frequently exhibit significant potency against human bacterial and fungal pathogens, that many genera are involved, that many folkloric uses can be rationalized on this basis, that the active constituents are readily isolated by bioassay-directed techniques, that their chemical structures are types uncommon amongst fermentation-based agents but are familiar to natural product chemists, that their antimicrobial spectra are comparatively narrow but that their potency is often reasonable, that they are comparatively easy to synthesize and the unnatural analogues so produced can possess enhanced therapeutic potential and, thus, it is concluded that such work generates a gratifying number of novel lead structures and that the possibility of finding additional agents for human or agricultural use based upon higher plant agents is realistic.

Antibacterial activity of orsellinates

“…In fact, algae, lichens, macrofungi, and higher plants now constitute important sources for prospecting for new bioactive molecules, either by the direct use of their secondary metabolites or by employing their biosynthetic or semi-synthetically derived compounds, which are produced with the aim of attaining higher effectiveness, improved absorption, or even decreased toxicity (3,5,7). In accordance with this line of action, the present work studied the antibacterial activity of lecanoric acid, extracted from the lichen P. tinctorum, as well as its derivatives obtained through alcoholysis.…”

Plants as Potential Sources of Pesticidal Agents: A Review

“…This may be achieved by using bioassay-guided fractionation which has been shown by some workers to ensure that bioactive compounds of the same chemical class in a crude plant extract are consistently pooled together. The procedure has been shown to improve activity dramatically and has been used to obtain active compounds from plants that were previously considered to be inactive [76].…”

Anticariogenic Activity and Haemolytic Study of Some Medicinal Plants Leaf Protein Extract against Six Oral pathogens in In vitro condition

“…Previous studies have demonstrated the antibacterial effect of plant extracts (Ross et al, 1980;Deans and Richie, 1987;Mitscher et al, 1987;Scheie, 1989;Heisey and Gorham, 1992;Shapiro et al, 1994;Larsen et al, 1996;Tichy and Novak, 1998;Van der Weijden et al, 1998;Ishnava et al, 2012) against oral bacteria. it has been well documented that medicinal plants confer antimicrobial activity towards oral bacteria .…”