Isolation and Identification of Some Antimicrobial Insecticidal and Antidiabetic Phytochemicals from the Medicinal Plants

Abstract

Plants are the elixir of life. Throughout the ages, humans have relied on nature for their basic needs - food, shelter, clothing, fertilizers and medicines. There are ample evidences from the past such as written documents, preserved monuments and original plant medicines that shows the connection between man and his search for drugs. Rigveda, the most previous book, provides enormous information on this matter. Awareness of medicinal plants usage is a result of the many years of struggles against illnesses due to which man learned to pursue drug in bark, seed, fruit bodies and other parts of the plants. The Tang Herbals and The Chinese Materia Medica are the documented records of the use of natural products.Turmeric has been used in Indian Ayurveda as medicine as early as 1900 B.C. Many other herbs and minerals used in Ayurveda were later described by ancient Indian herbalists such as Charaka and Sushruta during the first millennium. 64 preparations from mineral sources and 57 preparations based on animal sources are reported in Sushruta Samhita Ayurveda has been derived from the Indian words, Ayar stands for life and Vedas for knowledge. Treatment of plants for various human ailments has been described in Ayurveda and other Indian literature. Phytotherapists, the modern practitioners tried to explain the action of various herbs in terms of their chemical constituents. It is assumed that specific combination of various secondary metabolites present in plants enhances efficacy and removes adverse effects. Pharmacists prefer the use of single isolated phytochemical as medicine where as herbalists believe that various phytochemicals present in plant extracts interact to increase the therapeutic effect and decrease toxicity. The first active principles isolated from the plants were morphine, atropine and colchicine. Morphine is the first commercial pure natural product isolated by E. Merck in 1826. newline