BIOLOGICAL-ACTIVITIES OF SOME TURKISH MEDICINAL-PLANTS

Turkey has an extraordinarily rich flora and wide knowledge of their i ndigenous medicinal plants. Medicinal plants constitute an important c omponent of flora and are widely distributed in different floristic re gions of Turkey. Historically, plants have supplied the chemistry for over 25 % of prescription drugs used in human medicine(l) and such bio logically active plants have also provided leads to natural insecticid es(2). Accordingly, we are investigating the potential, of Turkish med icinal plants as a resource of new chemistry for public health and pla nt protection. The biological evaluation of substances from plant sour ces is highly releavant for the identification of lead compounds which can result in the development of novel and safe medicinal agents. Dur ing our extensive studies with Turkish medicinal plants, we have isola ted and characterized a large number of natural products. On the other hand, a more systematical approach to the discovery of drugs from the se plants has been initiated using bioassay-guided fractionation. At t he end of this fractionation of selected plant extracts has resulted i n the identification of active compounds representing a wide range of structures, including alkaloids, terpenoids and phenolic compounds(3). Fifty five organosoluble extracts prepared from Turkish medicinal pla nts were investigated for their biological activities against insects, nematodes, plant pathogens and brine shrimp in addition to their biol ogical activities such as antimalarial, anticholinergic, analgesic and antiplatelet activities.