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Theobromine, also known as xantheose, is the principal alkaloid of Theobroma cacao. Theobromine is slightly water-soluble (330 mg/L) with a bitter taste. In industry, theobromine is used as an additive and precursor to some cosmetics. It is found in chocolate, as well as in a number of other foods, including the leaves of the tea plant, and the kola nut. It is a white or colourless solid, but commercial samples can appear yellowish.
Phytochemicals are chemical compounds produced by plants, generally to help them resist fungi, bacteria and plant virus infections, and also consumption by insects and other animals. The name comes from Greek φυτόν (phyton) 'plant'. Some phytochemicals have been used as poisons and others as traditional medicine.
Saponins, also selectively referred to as triterpene glycosides, are bitter-tasting usually toxic plant-derived organic chemicals that have a foamy quality when agitated in water. They are widely distributed but found particularly in soapwort, a flowering plant, the soapbark tree and soybeans. They are used in soaps, medicines, fire extinguishers, speciously as dietary supplements, for synthesis of steroids, and in carbonated beverages. Saponins are both water and fat soluble, which gives them their useful soap properties. Some examples of these chemicals are glycyrrhizin and quillaia, a bark extract used in beverages.
Pharmacognosy is the study of crude drugs obtained from medicinal plants, animals, fungi, and other natural sources. The American Society of Pharmacognosy defines pharmacognosy as "the study of the physical, chemical, biochemical, and biological properties of drugs, drug substances, or potential drugs or drug substances of natural origin as well as the search for new drugs from natural sources".
Medicinal plants, also called medicinal herbs, have been discovered and used in traditional medicine practices since prehistoric times. Plants synthesize hundreds of chemical compounds for various functions, including defense and protection against insects, fungi, diseases, and herbivorous mammals.
Phytochemistry is the study of phytochemicals, which are chemicals derived from plants. Phytochemists strive to describe the structures of the large number of secondary metabolites found in plants, the functions of these compounds in human and plant biology, and the biosynthesis of these compounds. Plants synthesize phytochemicals for many reasons, including to protect themselves against insect attacks and plant diseases. The compounds found in plants are of many kinds, but most can be grouped into four major biosynthetic classes: alkaloids, phenylpropanoids, polyketides, and terpenoids.
Harmine is a beta-carboline and a harmala alkaloid. It occurs in a number of different plants, most notably the Syrian rue and Banisteriopsis caapi. Harmine reversibly inhibits monoamine oxidase A (MAO-A), an enzyme which breaks down monoamines, making it a Reversible inhibitor of monoamine oxidase A (RIMA). Harmine does not inhibit MAO-B. Harmine is also known as banisterin, banisterine, telopathin, telepathine, leucoharmine and yagin, yageine.
Harmaline is a fluorescent indole alkaloid from the group of harmala alkaloids and beta-carbolines. It is the partly hydrogenated form of harmine.
Noscapine is a benzylisoquinoline alkaloid, of the phthalideisoquinoline structural subgroup, which has been isolated from numerous species of the family Papaveraceae. It lacks significant hypnotic, euphoric, or analgesic effects affording it with very low addictive potential. This agent is primarily used for its antitussive (cough-suppressing) effects.
Delphinine is a toxic diterpenoid alkaloid found in plants from the Delphinium (larkspur) and Atragene genera, both in the family Ranunculaceae. Delphinine is the principal alkaloid found in Delphinium staphisagria seeds – at one time, under the name stavesacre, a very well known herbal treatment for body lice. It is related in structure and has similar effects to aconitine, acting as an allosteric modulator of voltage gated sodium channels, and producing low blood pressure, slowed heart rate and abnormal heart rhythms. These effects make it highly poisonous. While it has been used in some alternative medicines, most of the medical community does not recommend using it due to its extreme toxicity.
Bernard Hyland, known as Bernie Hyland, is an Australian botanist.
Ivan Addae-Mensah, is a Ghanaian chemist and university administrator who served as the Vice-Chancellor of the University of Ghana, Legon from 1996 to 2002. He is an Emeritus Professor of Chemistry at the same institution. He is a Life Fellow of the Royal Society of Chemistry, Fellow of the Ghana Academy of Arts and Sciences and a Fellow of the Ghana Chemical Society.
Arne Jørgen Aasen is a Norwegian chemist and professor emeritus at the University of Oslo, School of Pharmacy. Aasen received his engineering degree in biochemistry and organic chemistry in 1964, and a doctorate in organic chemistry in August 1966 from The Norwegian Institute of Technology, Trondheim. In 1972 he defended his thesis for a doctorate at The Royal Institute of Technology, Stockholm, Sweden.
John Geoffrey Tracey was an Australian ecologist and botanist whose pioneering research work in partnership with Dr. Leonard Webb within the Rainforest Ecology Unit of the CSIRO in the 1950s led to the publication of the first systematic classification of Australian rainforest vegetation in the Journal of Ecology in 1959. By the early 80's, after decades of ongoing research, Tracey and Webb had accumulated a significant corpus of scientific evidence in support of the theory that Australian tropical rainforests had evolved in Gondwana over 100 million years ago and were not, as previously believed, relatively recent arrivals from South East Asia. This evidence, in combination with Tracey and Webb's 1975 publication of a collection of 15 vegetation maps entitled "Vegetation of the Humid Tropical Region of North Queensland", and Tracey's 1982 paper "The Vegetation of the Humid Tropical Region of North Queensland", helped to establish the scientific basis for a number of major conservation campaigns across Queensland and paved the way for the subsequent successful World Heritage nomination of the Wet Tropics of Queensland by Aila Keto in 1988.
Leonard James Webb was a widely awarded Australian ecologist and ethnobotanist who was the author or joint-author of over 112 scientific papers throughout the course of his professional career. His pioneering work as Senior Principal Research Scientist alongside Geoff Tracey in the CSIRO Rainforest Ecology Research Unit in the 1950s led to the publication of the first systematic classification of Australian rainforest vegetation in the Journal of Ecology in 1959.
Hilda Geissmann was a pioneering Australian botanist, naturalist and photographer whose botanical and ornithological research within the Mount Tamborine area of South East Queensland significantly contributed to the early ecological understanding of the region.
Samuel Justin Dansie was an Australian forester and botanist who was an influential early figure associated with the emergence of a conservation ethos in the use and management of the Wet Tropical rainforests of Northern Queensland. During his 36-year tenure within the Queensland Forestry Department, Dansie was instrumental in identifying and securing the protection of a number of key conservation areas, both within and outside of state forests in the region.
References
- ↑ Tracey, J. G. (John Geoffrey); Borschmann, Gregg (1994), John Tracey interviewed by Gregg Borschmann in the People's forest oral history project, pp. 9, 12, 52
- ↑ Price, J. R.; Lamberton, J. A.; Culvenor, C.C.J (1992), The Australian Phytochemical Survey: historical aspects of the CSIRO search for new drugs in Australian plants. Historical Records of Australian Science, 9(4), 335–356, Australian Academy of Science, pp. 335, 336
- ↑ Price, J. R.; Lamberton, J. A.; Culvenor, C.C.J (1992), The Australian Phytochemical Survey: historical aspects of the CSIRO search for new drugs in Australian plants. Historical Records of Australian Science, 9(4), 335–356, Australian Academy of Science, pp. 354, 355
- ↑ Collins, D.J.; Culvenor, C.C.J; Lamberton, J. A. (1990), Plants for Medicines: A Chemical and Pharmacological Survey of Plants in the Australian Region, CSIRO
- ↑ Webb, L. J. (Leonard James) (1950), An Australian phytochemical survey : Alkaloids in Queensland flowering plants, Brisbane
- ↑ Webb, L. J.; Tracey, J. G.; Haydock, K.P. (1959), An Australian phytochemical survey. III. Saponins in eastern Australian flowering plants, CSIRO, doi:10.25919/5xj5-7648