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The Biological Activity of Natural Alkaloids against Herbivores, Cancerous Cells and Pathogens

The growing incidence of microorganisms that resist antimicrobials is a constant concern for the scientific community, while the development of new antimicrobials from new chemical entities has become more and more expensive, time-consuming, and exacerbated by emerging drug-resistant strains. In thi...

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Autores principales: Thawabteh, Amin, Juma, Salma, Bader, Mariam, Karaman, Donia, Scrano, Laura, Bufo, Sabino A., Karaman, Rafik
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: MDPI 2019
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6891610/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/31717922
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/toxins11110656
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author Thawabteh, Amin
Juma, Salma
Bader, Mariam
Karaman, Donia
Scrano, Laura
Bufo, Sabino A.
Karaman, Rafik
author_facet Thawabteh, Amin
Juma, Salma
Bader, Mariam
Karaman, Donia
Scrano, Laura
Bufo, Sabino A.
Karaman, Rafik
author_sort Thawabteh, Amin
collection PubMed
description The growing incidence of microorganisms that resist antimicrobials is a constant concern for the scientific community, while the development of new antimicrobials from new chemical entities has become more and more expensive, time-consuming, and exacerbated by emerging drug-resistant strains. In this regard, many scientists are conducting research on plants aiming to discover possible antimicrobial compounds. The secondary metabolites contained in plants are a source of chemical entities having pharmacological activities and intended to be used for the treatment of different diseases. These chemical entities have the potential to be used as an effective antioxidant, antimutagenic, anticarcinogenic and antimicrobial agents. Among these pharmacologically active entities are the alkaloids which are classified into a number of classes, including pyrrolizidines, pyrrolidines, quinolizidines, indoles, tropanes, piperidines, purines, imidazoles, and isoquinolines. Alkaloids that have antioxidant properties are capable of preventing a variety of degenerative diseases through capturing free radicals, or through binding to catalysts involved indifferent oxidation processes occurring within the human body. Furthermore, these entities are capable of inhibiting the activity of bacteria, fungi, protozoan and etc. The unique properties of these secondary metabolites are the main reason for their utilization by the pharmaceutical companies for the treatment of different diseases. Generally, these alkaloids are extracted from plants, animals and fungi. Penicillin is the most famous natural drug discovery deriving from fungus. Similarly, marines have been used as a source for thousands of bioactive marine natural products. In this review, we cover the medical use of natural alkaloids isolated from a variety of plants and utilized by humans as antibacterial, antiviral, antifungal and anticancer agents. An example for such alkaloids is berberine, an isoquinoline alkaloid, found in roots and stem-bark of Berberis asculin P. Renault plant and used to kill a variety of microorganisms.
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spelling pubmed-68916102019-12-12 The Biological Activity of Natural Alkaloids against Herbivores, Cancerous Cells and Pathogens Thawabteh, Amin Juma, Salma Bader, Mariam Karaman, Donia Scrano, Laura Bufo, Sabino A. Karaman, Rafik Toxins (Basel) Review The growing incidence of microorganisms that resist antimicrobials is a constant concern for the scientific community, while the development of new antimicrobials from new chemical entities has become more and more expensive, time-consuming, and exacerbated by emerging drug-resistant strains. In this regard, many scientists are conducting research on plants aiming to discover possible antimicrobial compounds. The secondary metabolites contained in plants are a source of chemical entities having pharmacological activities and intended to be used for the treatment of different diseases. These chemical entities have the potential to be used as an effective antioxidant, antimutagenic, anticarcinogenic and antimicrobial agents. Among these pharmacologically active entities are the alkaloids which are classified into a number of classes, including pyrrolizidines, pyrrolidines, quinolizidines, indoles, tropanes, piperidines, purines, imidazoles, and isoquinolines. Alkaloids that have antioxidant properties are capable of preventing a variety of degenerative diseases through capturing free radicals, or through binding to catalysts involved indifferent oxidation processes occurring within the human body. Furthermore, these entities are capable of inhibiting the activity of bacteria, fungi, protozoan and etc. The unique properties of these secondary metabolites are the main reason for their utilization by the pharmaceutical companies for the treatment of different diseases. Generally, these alkaloids are extracted from plants, animals and fungi. Penicillin is the most famous natural drug discovery deriving from fungus. Similarly, marines have been used as a source for thousands of bioactive marine natural products. In this review, we cover the medical use of natural alkaloids isolated from a variety of plants and utilized by humans as antibacterial, antiviral, antifungal and anticancer agents. An example for such alkaloids is berberine, an isoquinoline alkaloid, found in roots and stem-bark of Berberis asculin P. Renault plant and used to kill a variety of microorganisms. MDPI 2019-11-11 /pmc/articles/PMC6891610/ /pubmed/31717922 http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/toxins11110656 Text en © 2019 by the authors. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).
spellingShingle Review
Thawabteh, Amin
Juma, Salma
Bader, Mariam
Karaman, Donia
Scrano, Laura
Bufo, Sabino A.
Karaman, Rafik
The Biological Activity of Natural Alkaloids against Herbivores, Cancerous Cells and Pathogens
title The Biological Activity of Natural Alkaloids against Herbivores, Cancerous Cells and Pathogens
title_full The Biological Activity of Natural Alkaloids against Herbivores, Cancerous Cells and Pathogens
title_fullStr The Biological Activity of Natural Alkaloids against Herbivores, Cancerous Cells and Pathogens
title_full_unstemmed The Biological Activity of Natural Alkaloids against Herbivores, Cancerous Cells and Pathogens
title_short The Biological Activity of Natural Alkaloids against Herbivores, Cancerous Cells and Pathogens
title_sort biological activity of natural alkaloids against herbivores, cancerous cells and pathogens
topic Review
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6891610/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/31717922
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/toxins11110656
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