Antiviral Properties of Phytochemicals

In recent years, significant progress has been achieved for the development of novel anti-viral drugs. These newly developed drugs belong to three groups of compounds, nucleoside analogues, thymidine kinase-dependent nucleotide analogues and specific viral enzyme inhibitors. It has been found that the natural products, like plant-derived compounds (phytochemicals) as well as traditional medicines, like traditional Chinese medicines (TCM), Ayurvedic medicines and so on, are the important sources for potential and novel anti-viral drugs. In this chapter, the history of natural products as antiviral drugs, the approaches to discover potential lead compounds, and the anti-viral properties of phytochemicals with different action mechanisms are discussed. The key conclusion is that natural products are most important sources for novel anti-viral drugs.