Terminalia arjuna a sacred medicinal plant: phytochemical and pharmacological profile

Abstract

Terminalia arjuna Wight & Arn. (Combretaceae) is a tree having an extensive medicinal potential. The plant is used traditionally in the treatment of various aliments. T. arjuna is a very good hypocholsteremic, hypolipidemic, anticoagulant, antihypertensive, antithrombotic, antiviral, antifungal and antibacterial agent Various parts of plant have been investigated for the presence of phytoconstituents and pharmacological activities. Many useful phytoconstituents have been isolated from T. arjuna. Triterpenoids are mainly responsible for cardiovascular properties. Tannins and flavonoids are responsible for its anticancer properties. The present review summarizes the ethnic use, pharmacological activities of the extracts and phytoconstituents of T. arjuna for last 90 years.

Xanthone from the Fruits of <I>Terminalia Arjuna</I>

“…Fruits and Bark of T. arjuna have been used as diuretic [1], tonic [4] an antioxidant [5], anticancer [6,7] hypocholesterolaemic, hypolipidemic [8][9][10], antiulcer [11], antiviral, antifungal and antibacterial [12][13][14][15][16] agents. A number of triterpenoids, saponines, tannins, cardenolides and flavonoids were reported from earlier phytochemical investigations of T. arjuna [17][18][19][20][21][22][23][24]. In the present study, we have isolated one xanthone identified as 2,7-dimethoxyxanthone (1) [ Fig.…”

Antibacterial and antifungal activity of Terminalia arjuna Wight & Arn. bark against multi-drug resistant clinical isolates

“…In fact, a number of pharmacological studies have validated the ethnomedical reputation of the bark of T. arjuna as an excellent cardiotonic agent [6] . Among the various kinds of secondary metabolites isolated from this plant, the triterpenoids and glycosides were shown to be particularly effective in treatment of cardiovascular diseases, while the flavonoids and polyphenols exerted antioxidant, hypolipidemic, and antiinflammatory properties [5,18] . So far, the antimicrobial potential of T. arjuna have been sparsely investigated against only a few selected bacterial and fungal species [7,8] .…”

“…MIC for TAM and TAW against the fungal isolates was determined in a similar procedure, using sabouraud dextrose broth in 96-well microtitre plates incubated for 18 h at 35 °C [13,14] . The presence of visible growth was determined spectrophotometrically as above.…”

Cough and Arabinogalactan Polysaccharide from the Bark of Terminalia Arjuna

“…There are, however, other medicinal applications of T. arjuna bark extracts such as its being an astringent, aphrodisiac, tonic, or used in therapy of fractures, ulcers, diabetes, tumors, inflammation, skin disorders (Kumar 2014;Paarakh 2010). Some of these activities have already been experimentally approved, e.g., antioxidant and anticancer action (Jain et al 2009), or anti-inflammatory, imunomodulatory, and antinociceptive action (Halder et al 2009). The effect of this plant on cough and respiratory system has not yet been investigated.…”