Analysis of additivity and synergism in the anti-plasmodial effect of purified compounds from plant extracts

Abstract In the search for antimalarials from ethnobotanical origin, plant extracts are chemically fractionated and biological tests guide the isolation of pure active compounds. To establish the responsibility of isolated active compound(s) to the whole antiplasmodial activity of a crude extract, t...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Malaria Journal
Main Authors: Deharo Eric, Ginsburg Hagai
Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
Language:English
Published: BMC 2011
Subjects:
Online Access:https://doi.org/10.1186/1475-2875-10-S1-S5
https://doaj.org/article/aad22815c579481d87ece012754c250b
Description
Summary:Abstract In the search for antimalarials from ethnobotanical origin, plant extracts are chemically fractionated and biological tests guide the isolation of pure active compounds. To establish the responsibility of isolated active compound(s) to the whole antiplasmodial activity of a crude extract, the literature in this field was scanned and results were analysed quantitatively to find the contribution of the pure compound to the activity of the whole extract. It was found that, generally, the activity of isolated molecules could not account on their own for the activity of the crude extract. It is suggested that future research should take into account the “drugs beside the drug”, looking for those products (otherwise discarded along the fractionation process) able to boost the activity of isolated active compounds.