Natural products play an integral and ongoing role in promoting numerous aspects of scientific advancement, and many aspects of basic research programs are intimately related to natural products. With articles written by leading authorities in their respective fields of research, Studies in Natural Products Chemistry, Volume 37 presents current frontiers and future guidelines for research based on important discoveries made in the field of bioactive natural products. It is a valuable source for researchers and engineers working in natural products and medicinal chemistry. - Describes the chemistry of bioactive natural products - Contains contributions by leading authorities in the field - A valuable source for researchers and engineers working in natural product and medicinal chemistry

Natural products chemistry-the chemistry of metabolite products of plants, animals and microorganisms-is involved in the investigation of biological phenomena ranging from drug mechanisms to gametophytes and receptors and drug metabolism in the human body to protein and enzyme chemistry. Introduction to Natural Products Chemistry has collected the

Natural Products provides an insight into significant developments in some of the promising areas of natural products chemistry. Natural products are of great interest and promise in the present day research directed towards drug design and discovery. This book brings together leading scientists of the world, an overview of current discoveries and trends in this remarkable field. The topics, ranging from natural products chemistry and phytochemistry in their most basic form to molecular biology, pharmacology and in silico drug design, summarize years of extensive research in each area, and provide insight in the new themes of natural products research. The book serves as a valuable resource for researchers in their own fields to predict promising leads for developing pharmaceuticals to treat various ailments and disease manifestations; it also motivates young scientists to the dynamic field of bioactive natural products research.

Notoriously cumbersome to isolate and challenging to synthesize, the path of natural products to viable drugs is an arduous journey. Yet compounds isolated from nature may possess fascinating structures, biological profiles and pharmaceutical potential far greater than anything made by man. Natural Products Chemistry: Sources, Separations and Structures presents a practical guide to sourcing, isolating, and discovering new compounds from nature many of which become pharmaceutical drugs. This book emphasizes the challenges and advantages of products acquired from nature, compared to those obtained from combinatorial chemistry. A basic introduction, the book describes the whole cycle from farm to final compound, backed up by case studies drawn from industry and research applications. It broadens the scope of applications and draws upon examples from various sources. Natural products chemistry, as taught today, draws its examples mainly from marine chemistry or plant chemistry; however, there is also a fascinating and rich world of fermented (microbial and algal) products leading to complex structures. Thus, the book draws upon examples from the microbial world and from insects too. Therefore, this is a source of bioactive metabolites, not traditionally available in academic settings, more the mainstay of the pharmaceutical industry. Providing a roadmap of the process of collecting a compound from nature, isolating the active ingredient, and determining the chemical structure, this book provides a unique approach to the world of natural products.

Natural products are sought after by the food, pharmaceutical and cosmetics industries, and research continues into their potential for new applications. Extraction of natural products in an economic and environmentally-friendly way is of high importance to all industries involved. This book presents a holistic and in-depth view of the techniques available for extracting natural products, with modern and more environmentally-benign methods, such as ultrasound and supercritical fluids discussed alongside conventional methods. Examples and case studies are presented, along with the decision-making process needed to determine the most appropriate method. Where appropriate, scale-up and process integration is discussed. Relevant to researchers in academia and industry, and students aiming for either career path, Natural Product Extraction presents a handy digest of the current trends and latest developments in the field with concepts of Green Chemistry in mind.

The inspiration provided by biologically active natural products to conceive of hybrids, congeners, analogs and unnatural variants is discussed by experts in the field in 16 highly informative chapters. Using well-documented studies over the past decade, this timely monograph demonstrates the current importance and future potential of natural products as starting points for the development of new drugs with improved properties over their progenitors. The examples are chosen so as to represent a wide range of natural products with therapeutic relevance among others, as anticancer agents, antimicrobials, antifungals, antisense nucleosides, antidiabetics, and analgesics. From the content: * Part I: Natural Products as Sources of Potential Drugs and Systematic Compound Collections * Part II: From Marketed Drugs to Designed Analogs and Clinical Candidates * Part III: Natural Products as an Incentive for Enabling Technologies * Part IV: Natural Products as Pharmacological Tools * Part V: Nature: The Provider, the Enticer, and the Healer

Lichens are fascinating symbiotic organisms, biosynthesizing a broad spectrum of interesting secondary metabolites and polysaccharides. A considerable number of them have been found to exert biological activities, such as antibiotic, antimycobacterial, antiviral, anti-inflammatory, analgesic, antipyretic, antiproliferative, and cytotoxic effects. Only a very low percentage of “lichen substances” have been actually screened for their biological activities and their potential therapeutic applications in medicine. This is due to difficulties to obtain large quantities of lichens from nature, isolated lichen fungi and algae from cultures for extractions. Ten years ago, we have started to bypass these problems by introducing first traditional and then by exploring novel microbiological techniques and advanced molecular tools for our culture experiments. “Case studies” with selected cultured mycobionts and photobionts, accumulating considerable quantities of a focused compound, have been performed as tests for large-scale culturing, to be able to utilize facilities like phytotrons and bioreactors (small-scale bioreactors) for future approaches. Further studies have focused on the chemical identification of the metabolites from cultures and the genetic characterization of lichen PKS genes (Polyketide synthase genes). Another interesting group of lichen metabolites is cell wall polysaccharides. All lichen species investigated so far produce these polymers in considerable amounts and many of them have been shown to exhibit antitumor, immunostimulating, antiviral as well as other types of biological activity. Lichens polysaccharides are mainly of the following structural types: α-glucans (isolichenan, nigeran, pseudonigeran, and pullulan), β-glucans (lichenan, pustulan, laminaran, and lentinan-type glucan), galactomannans, and complex heteroglycans (galactoglucomannan, galactomannoglucan, rhamnopyranosylgalactofuranan, and glucomannan). Investigations on lichen polysaccharides were carried out using material extracted from the entire thallus with no mention of the origin of component polymers (fungal partner or photobiont). In order to understand the contribution of the symbiotic partners to the polysaccharide present in the lichen thallus, the carbohydrates produced by some aposymbiotically cultured mycobionts and photobionts (Trebouxia, Asterochloris, and Coccomyxa) were analyzed. The studies demonstrated that most of the polysaccharides previously found in the symbiotic thalli were also produced by the aposymbiotically cultivated fungal partner, while there were no similarities between the polysaccharides extracted from the photobiont with those from the respective lichen. Surprisingly, the photobionts synthesized very interesting polysaccharides, such as β-galactofuranan, mannogalactofuranan, rhamnopyranosylgalactofuranan, and an O-methylated mannogalactan. One of them was biologically active, having in vitro activity on murine peritoneal macrophages.