An Insect Antifeedant and Antimicrobial Agent from Plumbago capensis

Abstract

Plumbagin, a naphtoquinone compound was isolated from Plumbago Capensis (Plumbaginaceae), an East African medicinal plant. This compound exhibited relatively specific antimicrobial activity against yeasts and potent insect antifeedant activity against the larvae of African arrny worms.

Plumbagin quantification in roots of Plumbago scandens L. obtained by different extraction techniques

“…Plumbagin showed anticancer (Melo et al 1974), leishmanicidal (Chan-Bacab andPeña-Rodriguez 2001) and bactericidal (Durga et al 1990) activities, being also effective against insects (Kubo et al 1980, Ghosh et al 1994.…”

Antimicrobial activities of neo- and 1-epineo-isoshinanolones fromPlumbago zeylanicaroots

“…Several naphthoquinones, binaphthoquinones, flavonoids and β-sitosterol have been isolated from this plant by earlier workers (Gunaherath et al, 1983) and different biological activities such as antifeedant (Kubo et al, 1980) and antifertility (Azad et al, 1982) were also investigated. It was found to possess antitubercular activity also (Ranganatha Rao & Seshadri, 1955;Mossa et al, 2004).…”

Chemical ecology: chemical communication in nature

“…Two antifeedant compounds that have been recently identified are plumbagin (XLVII) and polygodial (XLVIII). Plumbagin was isolated from the roots of the East African medicinal plant, Plumbago capensis (45). The hot tasting sesquiterpene, polygodial, was isolated from the sprout of Polygonum hydropiper, a well-known Japanese relish (menji-so) for sashimi (46), and recently from the East African trees Warburgia ugandensis and IV.…”