<i>In vitro</i> antimalarial activity of extracts of some plants from a biological reserve in Costa Rica

Abstract

Treatment with the usual antimalarial drugs, have induced parasite resistance, reinforcing the need to finding natural antimalarial components that would be found on plants from the forest. Therefore, we decided to look for these components in Costa Rican plants from a protected forest area. Fresh and dry extracts of roots, bark, leaves, flowers and fruits of 25 plants from a biological reserve in Costa Rica, Reserva Biológica Alberto Manuel Brenes (REBAMB), were studied in vitro for the presence of substances with antimalarial activity. By studying the inhibition of P. berghei schizogony, we assessed the antimalarial activity of several plant extracts: Aphelandra aurantiaca, A. tridentata (Acanthaceae); Xanthosoma undipes (Araceae); Iriartea deltoidea (Arecaceae); Neurolaena lobata (Asteraceae); Senna papillosa, Pterocarpus hayessi, Lonchocarpus pentaphyllus (Fabaceae); Nectandra membranacea, Persea povedae, Cinamomum chavarrianum (Lauraceae); Hampea appendiculata (Malvaceae); Ruagea glabra, Guarea glabra (Meliaceae); Psidium guajava (Myrtaceae); Bocconia frutescens (Papaveraceae); Piper friedrichsthalii (Piperaceae); Clematis dioica (Ranunculaceae); Prunus annularis (Rosaceae); Siparuna thecaphora (Siparunaceae); Solanum arboreum, Witheringia solanacea (Solanaceae); Ticodendrum incognitum (Ticodendraceae); Heliocarpus appendiculatus (Tiliaceae) and Myriocarpa longipes (Urticaceae). We used different parts of the plants as well as fresh and dried extracts for testing IC50. The solid content of the extracts ranged from 1-71.9μg/mL. The fresh extracts showed stronger activity than the dry ones. Since the plants showing the strongest antimalarial activity are very common in Central America, and some similar genera of these plants have shown positives results in South America, we considered important to present these findings for discussion. On the other hand, this is the first systematic study of this kind ever realized in a circumscribed and protected area of Costa Rica. Rev. Biol. Trop. 60 (2): 881-891. Epub 2012 June 01.

Actividad contra Leishmania sp. (Kineplastida: Trypanosomatidae) de plantas en una Reserva Biológica de Costa Rica

“…En Costa Rica actualmente las investigaciones con plantas como antiparasitarios, se circunscriben a unos pocos estudios en relación con la toxoplasmosis (Chinchilla, Marín, & Catarinella, 1990) y con la malaria (Castro et al, 1996;Chinchilla et al, 2011Chinchilla et al, , 2012. Conociendo que en nuestro país existe la leishmaniosis cutánea desde hace mucho tiempo (Jaramillo-Antillón et al, 2009), y más recientemente la visceral (Carrillo et al, 1999), se hacía necesario indagar si tenemos plantas con componentes químicos con actividad contra Leishmania sp.…”

“…Se conocen trabajos en diversos países del Viejo Continente (Githinji et al, 2010;Mwangi et al, 2010;Bero, Hannaert, Chataigné, Hérent, & QuetinLeclercq, 2011;Fattahi, Reza, Hossein, Barzegar, & Ghafourzadeh, 2011;Kakar et al, 2013), América del Sur (Luize et al, 2005;Peixoto et al, 2011;De Lima et al, 2012;Cechinel et al, 2013) así como en Centroamérica y el Caribe (Fernández-Calienes et al, 2008;García, Monzote, Scull, & Herrera, 2012). En Costa Rica, aunque existen algunos estudios de componentes antiparasitarios en plantas (Castro, Barrios, Chinchilla, & Guerrero, 1996;Chinchilla, Guerrero, Abarca, Barrios, & Castro, 1998;Chinchilla, Guerrero, Tamayo, & Sittenfeld, 2001;Calderón et al, 2010;Chinchilla et al, 2011Chinchilla et al, , 2012, muy pocos de ellos se han realizado en relación con la leishmaniosis. Dada la riqueza de la biodiversidad costarricense y al encontrar en la literatura que contamos con especies de plantas de géneros en las que se han detectado componentes anti-Leishmania, se decidió seleccionar algunas de esas especies presentes en la Reserva Biológica Alberto Manuel Brenes (REBAMB), y realizar en ellas, los correspondientes análisis que dan origen al presente estudio.…”

In vivo antioxidant assessment of two antimalarial plants–Allamamda cathartica and Bixa orellana

“…It could be used to produce a common dye employed for a variety of purpose. It has a long history as a medicinal plant for the treatment of varied conditions such as feverish infections like gonorrhoea, dysentery and hepatitis, as well as for cough, snakebites, intestinal parasites, skin toning and for the treatment of diabetes in traditional medicine systems [14] .…”

Antimalarial Activity of an Alkaloid Mixture Isolated from the Tender Leaves of the Nectandra membranacea (Laureaceae)

“…Acording to the results reported by Chinchilla et al [19] in relation to the antiplasmodic activity of the crude extract of the tender leaves N. membranacea, fractionation was realized by column chromatography guided by TLC; a total of 58 fractions were obtained. The fraction more active indicated the presence of alkaloids when sprayed with Dragendorff reagent; of them it was possible to isolate two isoquinolinic alkaloids difficult to separate by CC (Fig.…”