|
Introduction: Herbal medicines are being used in
India since Vedic era. Ayurveda has described the use of
herbal medicine in Indian culture. In old days the
“Vaidyas” use to depend upon the medicinal plants which
are available in the deep forests. As the population is
increasing and so the use of medicines, harvesting from
the wild as a main source of raw material, is causing
loss of genetic diversity and habitat destruction. One
more difficulty associated with the dependence is that,
the exact information regarding their therapeutic value,
their location etc. is not known by normal people. It
was usually been transferred from the Vaidyas from
generations to generations. If, we talk about modern
medicine, plants continue to provide us new chemical
entities (lead molecules) for the development of drugs
against various pharmacological targets, including
cancer, HIV/AIDS, malaria, Alzheimer’s disease and pain
etc. It is estimated that around 250,000 flowering plant
species are reported to occur globally and approximately
half (125,000) of these are found in the tropical
forests. Several natural product drugs of plant origin
are in clinical use, including paclitaxel, camptothecin-derived
analogues, arteether, galanthamine, tiotropium to name a
few, and some are undergoing Phase II and Phase III
clinical trials. We all are aware with the benefits of
using herbal medicines as they are believed to be less
toxic than the synthetic medicines. They are established
from the ancient time and people trust them to treat
themselves since that time. The main problem with the
herbal medicines is that the identification of the
plants is really difficult. Other aspect of it is that,
even if, you collect and identify them correctly, their
medicinal value gets change with region and season. The
herb collected in the spring might not be as effective
as may in winter. Biotechnology has found out the
solution for these kind of problems associated with
herbal medicine. Now we can grow the medicinal plants in
the labs with their real identity and most effective
form. This has solution even for those problems which
are associated with the extinct variety of the plants.
The plants are being conserved by these techniques. The
use of controlled environments in these techniques can
overcome cultivation difficulties and could be a means
to manipulate phenotypic variation in bioactive
compounds and toxins.
They are so many plants which have actually provided us
very important drugs for the treatment of deadly disease
like cancer and HIV etc. (Table 1). These herbal
medicine are also been modified by chemical/synthetic
methods and have been utilized more efficiently than
their natural forms (Table 1).
Thus, from these above examples, it is evident that
natural as well as modifications of existing natural
products can lead to “New chemical entities” (NCEs) and
possible drug leads, from medicinal plants.
For full text of this article contact the publisher on
info@kppub.com
|
The above content is an
abstract only. For the full Article please contact:
KONGPOSH Publications Pvt. Ltd.
ICS House, C-19, Commercial Complex, SDA, Opp. IIT Gate,
New Delhi, India -110016
Tel.: 26855839, 20057149, Fax: 91-11-26855876
Email:
info@kppub.com /
fpc@vsnl.com, Website:
http://www.kppub.com |
