Proceedings of the 38th Annual Meeting at the Phytochemical Society of North America on Phytochemicals in Human Health Protection, Nutrition and Plant Defense, held July 26-31, 1998 in Pullman, WA, USA

This book starts with a general introduction to phytochemistry, followed by chapters on plant constituents, their origins and chemistry, but also discussing animal-, microorganism- and mineral-based drugs. Further chapters cover vitamins, food additives and excipients as well as xenobiotics and poisons. The book also explores the herbal approach to disease management and molecular pharmacognosy and introduces methods of qualitative and quantitative analysis of plant constituents. Phytochemicals are classified as primary (e.g. carbohydrates, lipids, amino acid derivations, etc.) or secondary (e.g. alkaloids, terpenes and terpenoids, phenolic compounds, glycosides, etc.) metabolites according to their metabolic route of origin, chemical structure and function. A wide variety of primary and secondary phytochemicals are present in medicinal plants, some of which are active phytomedicines and some of which are pharmaceutical excipients.

Nutraceuticals are bioactive phytochemicals that protect or promote health and occur at the intersection of food and pharmaceutical industries. This book will cover a wider spectrum of human health and diseases including the role of phytonutrients in the prevention and treatment. The Book includes chapters dealing with biological and clinical effect, molecular level approach, quality assurance, bioavailability and metabolism of a number phytochemicals and their role to combat different diseases.

Phytochemicals from medicinal plants are receiving ever greater attention in the scientific literature, in medicine, and in the world economy in general. For example, the global value of plant-derived pharmaceuticals will reach $500 billion in the year 2000 in the OECD countries. In the developing countries, over-the-counter remedies and "ethical phytomedicines," which are standardized toxicologically and clinically defined crude drugs, are seen as a promising low cost alternatives in primary health care. The field also has benefited greatly in recent years from the interaction of the study of traditional ethnobotanical knowledge and the application of modem phytochemical analysis and biological activity studies to medicinal plants. The papers on this topic assembled in the present volume were presented at the annual meeting of the Phytochemical Society of North America, held in Mexico City, August 15-19, 1994. This meeting location was chosen at the time of entry of Mexico into the North American Free Trade Agreement as another way to celebrate the closer ties between Mexico, the United States, and Canada. The meeting site was the historic Calinda Geneve Hotel in Mexico City, a most appropriate site to host a group of phytochemists, since it was the address of Russel Marker. Marker lived at the hotel, and his famous papers on steroidal saponins from Dioscorea composita, which launched the birth control pill, bear the address of the hotel.

Phytochemicals provides original research work and reviews on the sources of phytochemicals, and their roles in disease prevention, supplementation, and accumulation in fruits and vegetables. The roles of anthocyanin, flavonoids, carotenoids, and taxol are presented in separate chapters. Antioxidative and free radicle scavenging activity of phytochemicals is also discussed. The medicinal properties of Opuntia, soybean, sea buckthorn, and gooseberry are presented in a number of chapters. Supplementation of plant extract with phytochemical properties in broiler meals is discussed in one chapter. The final two chapters include the impact of agricultural practices and novel processing technologies on the accumulation of phytochemicals in fruits and vegetables. This book mainly focuses on medicinal plants and the disease-preventing properties of phytochemicals, which will be a useful resource to the reader.

This book presents comprehensive coverage on the importance of good nutrition in the treatment and management of obesity, cancer and diabetes. Naturally occurring bioactive compounds are ubiquitous in most dietary plants available to humans and provide opportunities for the management of diseases. The text provides information about the major causes of these diseases and their association with nutrition. The text also covers the role of dietary phytochemicals in drug development and their pathways. Later chapters emphasize novel bioactive compounds as anti-diabetic, anti-cancer and anti-obesity agents and describe their mechanisms to regulate cell metabolism. Written by global team of experts, Dietary Phytochemicals: A Source of Novel Bioactive Compounds for the Treatment of Obesity, Cancer and Diabetes describes the potentials of novel phytochemicals, their sources, and underlying mechanism of action. The chapters were drawn systematically and incorporated sequentially to facilitate proper understanding. This book is intended for nutritionists, physicians, medicinal chemists, drug developers in research and development, postgraduate students and scientists in area of nutrition and life sciences.