Abstract
Traditional herbal medicines, which have been used in the matured traditional medical systems as well as those have been used in ethnic medical systems, are invaluable resources of drug seeds. Ethnobotanical and ethnopharmacological survey may provide useful information of these herbal medicines, which are valuable for searching new bioactive molecules. From this viewpoint, we have been performing the ethnobotanical and ethnopharmacological field studies in Yunnan Province and Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, China, and Mongolia. Phytochemical studies on traditional herbal medicines were performed based on the information obtained by our ethnobotanical survey. Herbal medicines used in Uzbekistan and Bangladesh were also investigated on the basis of the ethnopharmacological information obtained from collaborative researchers in the respective regions. Some studies were carried out for searching active substance(s) based on bioassay-guided fractionation and isolation. Over 150 new molecules were isolated in these studies, and their various biological activities were also demonstrated. This review summarizes the results of phytochemical studies of those traditional herbal medicines as well as biological activities of the isolated molecules.Graphic abstract
Highlights
A variety of herbal medicines have been utilized in traditional medical systems as well as ethnic populations in various areas of the world
We have been collaborating with researchers in several countries, of which some have been performing ethnobotanical and ethnopharmacological surveys with the researchers based on the academic agreements between universities, while the others are collaborative studies with the researchers based on the exchange of ethnopharmacological information
Since finding new drug seeds from unexplored plant resources was of our interest, we investigated the constituents of the aerial parts of S. coleifolia, which resulted in the isolation of two new sesterterpenes, coleifolides A (21) and B (22), and twentynine new diterpenes, together with six known compounds (Fig. 5)
Summary
A variety of herbal medicines have been utilized in traditional medical systems as well as ethnic populations in various areas of the world. Our ethnopharmacological survey of Uzbek traditional herbal medicines and their phytochemical studies have been performing based on ethnopharmacological information exchanges with the researchers at Institute of Botany and Botanical Garden, Academy of Science of Uzbekistan and Institute of the Chemistry of Plant Substances, Academy Sciences of the Republic of Uzbekistan.
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