1: J Ethnopharmacol. 2008 Jan 4;115(1):25-9. Epub 2007 Sep 4.

Anti-inflammatory compounds from leaves and root bark of Alchornea cordifolia
(Schumach. & Thonn.) Müll. Arg.

Mavar-Manga H, Haddad M, Pieters L, Baccelli C, Penge A, Quetin-Leclercq J.

Laboratoire de Pharmacognosie, Unité CHAM 72.30, Ecole de Pharmacie, Université
catholique de Louvain, Av. E. Mounier, 72, 1200 Bruxelles, Belgium.

Alchornea cordifolia is one of the most widely-used plants in traditional
medicine throughout Africa, principally for inflammatory, antimicrobial and
parasitic diseases. In continuation of our investigations on its
anti-inflammatory activity, we fractionated the leaf and root bark extracts and
isolated six compounds which exhibited significant topical anti-inflammatory
activity in the mouse ear oedema model using croton oil at a dose of 90mug/cm(2).
Daucosterol (2), acetyl aleuritolic acid (4), N1,N2-diisopentenyl guanidine (5)
and N1,N2,N3-triisopentenyl guanidine (6) were shown to be more active than
indomethacin, while beta-sitosterol (1) and di(2-ethylhexyl) phthalate (3) were
less effective. This is the first report on the presence of compounds 1, 2, 3 and
4 in this plant and of the anti-inflammatory activity of 3, 5 and 6. These
compounds may account, at least in part, for the use of A. cordifolia in folk
medicine to treat inflammation.

PMID: 17942256 [PubMed - in process]

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