Medicinal plants used in the treatment of human immunodeficiency virus

Since the beginning of the epidemic, human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) has infected around 70 million people worldwide, most of whom reside is sub-Saharan Africa. There have been very promising developments in the treatment of HIV with anti-retroviral drug cocktails. However, drug resistance to anti-HIV drugs is emerging, and many people infected with HIV have adverse reactions or do not have ready access to currently available HIV chemotherapies. Thus, there is a need to discover new anti-HIV agents to supplement our current arsenal of anti-HIV drugs and to provide therapeutic options for populations with limited resources or access to currently efficacious chemotherapies. Plant-derived natural products continue to serve as a reservoir for the discovery of new medicines, including anti-HIV agents. This review presents a survey of plants that have shown anti-HIV activity, both in vitro and in vivo

Evaluation of Hungarian Wines for Resveratrol by Overpressured Layer Chromatography

A method, including solid phase extraction sample preparation, overpressured layer chromatographic separation and subsequent densitometric evaluation, was developed for measurement of total resveratrol (cis- and trans-isomers) content of wine. The amount of resveratrol was determined in wine samples from different winemaking regions of Hungary. The total resveratrol was high in Hungarian red wines (3.6–11 mg/L), and much lower in white ones (0.04–1.5 mg/L)

In-Vitro Susceptibility of Mycobacterium Tuberculosis to Extracts of Uvaria Afzelli Scott Elliot and Tetracera Alnifolia Willd

Tuberculosis is a global burden with one –third of the world’s population infected with the pathogen Mycobacterium tuberculosis and an annual 2 million deaths from the disease. This high incidence of infection and the increased rate of resistant strains of the organism (MDR- and XDR- TB) have called for an urgent need to develop new anti-tuberculosis drugs from plants. The crude extract of Uvaria afzelli Scott Elliot (Annonaceae) root bark, and leaves and root bark of Tetracera alnifolia Willd. (Dilleniaceae) were investigated for anti-Mycobacterium tuberculosis activity using the MABA assay method. Anti- Mtb activity was determined against Mtb H37RvATCC 27294 at concentrations of 100- 0.390μg/mL. The hexane and chloroform extracts of the root bark of Tetracera alnifolia and the chloroform extract of Uvaria afzelli had anti- Mtb activity with MIC <100 μg/mL. Phytochemical screening for secondary metabolites revealed the presence of tannins, triterpenoid saponins, cardiac glycoside and alkaloids. The anti- Mtb activity demonstrated by the crude extracts is attributed to the presence of tannins and other secondary metabolites which are known to have strong antimicrobial activity. The results therefore support the local use of Uvaria afzelli and Tetracera alnifolia in the treatment of cough associated with tuberculosis and other microbial infections of the respiratory tract and suggest that these plants may be of therapeutic importance in the treatment of tuberculosis

Combined in vivo imaging and omics approaches reveal metabolism of icaritin and its glycosides in zebrafish larvae

10.1039/c1mb00001bMolecular BioSystems772128-213

Medicinal plants used in the treatment of tuberculosis - Ethnobotanical and ethnopharmacological approaches

Tuberculosis is a highly infectious disease declared a global health emergency by the World Health Organization, with approximately one third of the world's population being latently infected with Mycobacterium tuberculosis. Tuberculosis treatment consists in an intensive phase and a continuation phase. Unfortunately, the appearance of multi drug-resistant tuberculosis, mainly due to low adherence to prescribed therapies or inefficient healthcare structures, requires at least 20 months of treatment with second-line, more toxic and less efficient drugs, i.e., capreomycin, kanamycin, amikacin and fluoroquinolones. Therefore, there exists an urgent need for discovery and development of new drugs to reduce the global burden of this disease, including the multi-drug-resistant tuberculosis. To this end, many plant species, as well as marine organisms and fungi have been and continue to be used in various traditional healing systems around the world to treat tuberculosis, thus representing a nearly unlimited source of active ingredients. Besides their antimycobacterial activity, natural products can be useful in adjuvant therapy to improve the efficacy of conventional antimycobacterial therapies, to decrease their adverse effects and to reverse mycobacterial multi-drug resistance due to the genetic plasticity and environmental adaptability of Mycobacterium. However, even if some natural products have still been investigated in preclinical and clinical studies, the validation of their efficacy and safety as antituberculosis agents is far from being reached, and, therefore, according to an evidence-based approach, more high-level randomized clinical trials are urgently needed