Drug discovery from plant sources: An integrated approach

Abstract

New drug discovery is facing serious challenges due to reduction in number of new drug approvals coupled with exorbitant rising cost. Advent of combinatorial chemistry provided new hope of higher success rates of new chemical entities (NCEs); however, even this scientific development has failed to improve the success rate in new drug discovery. This scenario has prompted us to come out with a novel approach of integrated drug discovery, where Ayurvedic wisdom can synergize with drug discovery from plant sources. Initial steps in new drug discovery involve identification of NCEs, which can be either sourced through chemical synthesis or can be isolated from natural products through biological activity guided fractionation. The sources of many of the new drugs and active ingredients of medicines are derived from natural products. The starting point for plant-based new drug discovery should be identification of the right candidate plants by applying Ayurvedic wisdom, traditional documented use, tribal non-documented use, and exhaustive literature search. Frequency analysis of the ingredients of the ancient documented formulations and analysis of their Ayurvedic attributes may provide an in-depth idea of the predominance of particular Ayurvedic characteristics based on which appropriate candidate plants may be selected for bioactivity-based fractionation. The integration of Ayurvedic wisdom with drug discovery also brings the need for a paradigm shift in the extraction process from sequential to parallel extraction. Bioassay-guided fractionation of the identified plant may lead to standardized extract or isolated bioactive druggable compound as the new drug. This integrated approach would lead to saving of cost and time, coupled with enhanced success rate in drug discovery.

The natural anti-tubercular agents: In silico study of physicochemical, pharmacokinetic and toxicological properties

“…Multidrug resistant strains of M. tuberculosis demands new drugs to restrain the spreading control of tuberculosis. The natural system always serve as a repository and generally mankind always looks into actinomycetes (Mahajan et al, 2011;Adegboye and Babalola, 2013;Patel et al, 2014), fungi (Smith and Ryan 2009;Aly et al, 2011), cyanobactria (Singh et al, 2011) and plants (Abdallah, 2011;Katiyar et al, 2012) for the new drug candidates. Numerous drugs and chemical agents have already been identified and the identification process is still on ongoing.…”

In vitro Evaluation of Antioxidant and Antiproliferative Activities of Artemisia nilagirica Extracts

“…Approximately 60% of all the approved drugs used in the treatment and/or prevention of cancers find their origin from natural products or natural product derivatives, of which plants contribute around 25% [10] . This has invoked the quest for efficient antioxidant and antiproliferative entities from different natural sources especially medicinal and aromatic plants [11] .…”

Pharmacokinetic Herb-Drug Interactions: Insight into Mechanisms and Consequences

“…To this end, there have been deliberations on the need for statutory regulation of UK herbal medicine and its practitioners [10,11].. It is worthy to note that approximately 30-50% of conventional medicines in use evolved from natural products from where they are synthesized as pharmaceutical preparations [12][13][14]. In particular are the medicines Catharanthus roseus (vincristine), Atropa belladonna (atropine), Cinchona sp.…”