Phytochemical Constituents, Folk Medicinal Uses, and Biological Activities of Genus Angelica: A Review

Abstract

Genus Angelica is one of the widely distributed and well-known genera of family Umbelliferae. It is utilized mainly by Chinese and Korean populations especially in their folk medicine. Angelica comprises a lot of medicinally important phytoconstituents such as coumarins, furanocoumarins, flavonoids, essential oils, verbascosides, polysaccharides, etc. Members of this genus play important roles, namely antioxidant, anti-inflammatory, anti-microbial, anti-diabetic, skin-whitening, cytotoxic, hepatoprotective, and many others. This review draws attention to many species of genus Angelica with much focus on A. dahurica being one of the highly medicinally used species within this genus.

Synthesis, Antiproliferative Activity and Molecular Docking Analysis of Both Enantiomerically Pure Decursin Derivatives as Anticancer Agents

“…As shown in Chart 1, (S)-decursinol (1) was coupled with various acid by EDC-mediated reaction to afford a series of (S)-decursin derivatives. The commercially unavailable carboxylic acids (7, 9 and 11) were synthesized according to the reported methods: 3-(E)-(Pyridin-2-yl)acrylic acid (7) was easily prepared in 21% yield from the reaction of pyridine-2-carboxaldehyde (6) with malonic acid catalyzed by piperidine under the reflux condition of pyridine solvent using Knoevenagel condensation.…”

“…On the hand other, the direct stereoinversion of (S)-decursinol (1) into (R)-decursinol (5, ent-1) was failed via the typical Mitsunobu reaction (AcOH, Ph3P, and DEAD condition) 19) and this failure might be due to the steric hindrance of geminal dimethyl groups at C-2' position of (S)-decursinol (1).…”

“…It contains chemically diverse compounds like coumarins, polyacetylenes, and essential oils. 1) Among them, decursin and its isomer decursinol angelate (DA) containing a pyranocoumarin scaffold were reported as the principal bioactive components of AGN as shown in Figure 1. [2][3][4] Diverse pharmacological activities of decursin and DA include anti-tumor activity 3,5) , anti-bacterial activity 6) , anti-inflammation activity 7) , anti-oxidant activity 8) and cognitive enhancement activity.…”

A comprehensive review of antitumor properties of Angelica species and their antitumor‐responsible constituents and the underlying molecular mechanisms involved in tumor inhibition

“…The composition of natural medicine is complicated, and they act on a variety of complex targets and pathways to abrogate cancer cell growth (Figures 4, 5). Coumarins and flavonoids, which are valuable constituents of Angelica species, are common sources of anticancer drugs due to their abundance and low to moderate toxicity (Batiha et al, 2023; Kubczak et al, 2021; Wu et al, 2020). Some flavonoids from Angelica plants have certain anticancer activity against different cancers by a variety of proteins and pathways involved in antitumor mechanisms (Xing et al, 2022).…”

“…Angelica is a genus of plant species of tall biennial and perennial herbs in the family Apiaceae (Batiha et al, 2023), native to temperate and subarctic regions of the Northern Hemisphere, reaching as far north as Iceland, Lapland, East Asia, and Greenland (Budniak et al, 2022). Mostly found in China, its root, seed, and fruit were used as medicine.…”