The potential of anti-malarial compounds derived from African medicinal plants, part II: a pharmacological evaluation of non-alkaloids and non-terpenoids

Abstract

Malaria is currently a public health concern in many countries in the world due to various factors which are not yet under check. Drug discovery projects targeting malaria often resort to natural sources in the search for lead compounds. A survey of the literature has led to a summary of the major findings regarding plant-derived compounds from African flora, which have shown anti-malarial/antiplasmodial activities, tested by in vitro and in vivo assays. Considerations have been given to compounds with activities ranging from “very active” to “weakly active”, leading to >500 chemical structures, mainly alkaloids, terpenoids, flavonoids, coumarins, phenolics, polyacetylenes, xanthones, quinones, steroids and lignans. However, only the compounds that showed anti-malarial activity, from “very active” to “moderately active”, are discussed in this review.

Antimalarial Activity of the n-Butanol Fraction of Uapaca togoensis (Pax) Stem Bark in Mice

“…38 Secondary metabolites such as alkaloids, saponins, flavonoids, tannins and phenols which were found present in the n-butanol fraction have been reported to possess antimalarial actions. [39][40] Alkaloids have been reported to produce antimalarial properties by blocking protein synthesis in Plasmodium parasites. 41 Saponins, flavonoids and tannins have been suggested to act as primary antioxidant or free radicals scavengers that can counteract the oxidative damage induced by the malaria parasite.…”

Ethnobotanical survey and in vitro antiplasmodial activity of medicinal plants used to treat malaria in Kagera and Lindi regions, Tanzania

“…In previous studies Abrus precatorius, Adansonia digitata, Azadirachta indica, Cassia cordatum, Todalia asiatica, Vangueria infausta, Vernonia amygdalina, and Zanthoxylum chalybeum were reported to be used in the treatment of malaria in Tanzania and some of them have shown good in vitro antimalarial activity against multi-drug resistant P. falciparum K1 malaria parasites (Amri et al, 2012;Augustino et al, 2011;Gessler et al, 1994;Weenen et al, 1990 (Lacroix et al, 2011;Nguta et al, 2010;Tabuti et al, 2008;Titanji et al, 2008;Katuura et al, 2007;Odugbemi et al, 2007). It is notable that some of the reported plants belong to the families Compositae (13%), Euphorbiaceae (7.4%), Fabaceae (11.1%), and Rubiaceae (9.2%) which are known to contain chemical compounds with good antimalarial properties (Ntie-Kang et al, 2014;Batista et al, 2009). The study has provided useful information that supports traditional healers' claims for antimalarial activity and earlier observations that plants used in traditional medicine are a potential source of new antimalarial lead compounds (Onguéné et al, 2013;Bero et al, 2009).…”

Application of multi-target phytotherapeutic concept in malaria drug discovery: a systems biology approach in biomarker identification

“…A review of potential anti-malarial components that have been identified from plants cover a very wide range of phytochemicals classes, which include alkaloids, terpenoids, flavonoids, coumarins, phenolics, polyacetylenes, xanthones, quinones, steroids and lignans [3, 34, 35]. Extracting each necessitates specific extraction technique, making it cumbersome and time-consuming for the investigator, especially given the fact that there might be little or no activity after extraction and isolation, as has been the case with many small molecules that have been tested for their activity.…”