ISOLATION OF GALLIC ACID-ESTERS AS ANTIPLASMODIAL CONSTITUENTS OF SWINTONIA-FOXWORTHYI (ANACARDIACEAE)

An extract of a leaf and twig sample from Swintonia foxworthyi demonst rated weak in vitro activity against two clones of Plasmodium falcipar um. At the same time, the extract was inactive in cancer cell cytotoxi city assays. Bioassay-directed fractionation led to the isolation of m ethyl gallate as the principal antiplasmodial constituent; the compoun d demonstrated estimated IC50 values of 2.0 and 3.5 mu g/ml against th e W2 and D6 clones of P. falciparum, respectively. Methyl digallate wa s also isolated from an active fraction and demonstrated estimated IC5 0 values of 4.6 and 5.3 mu g/ml against the W2 and D6 clones, respecti vely.