A systematic survey of phenolic compounds in the leaves of species from the genus Glycine subgenus Glycine Willd. (Hymowitz and Newell, 1981) is currently in progress in this laboratory. Two phenolic compounds, genistin (genistein-7-glucoside) and coumestrol, have long been known to have estrogenic activity (Bickoff et al., 1969) and both compounds have been reported from annual species of the genus Glycine (Wada and Masataka, 1964; Walz, 1931). Coumestrol and genistin were isolated and identified from leaves of Glycine tabacina using the methods of Mabry et al. (1970)
