Title:Phenolics and Terpenoids; the Promising New Search for Anthelmintics: A Critical Review
Volume: 16
Issue: 17
Author(s): Niladri Mukherjee, Suprabhat Mukherjee, Prasanta Saini, Priya Roy and Santi P. Sinha Babu
Affiliation:
Keywords:
Drug development, Helminth parasites, Natural products, Phenolics, Terpenoids.
Abstract: Ailments caused by helminth parasites are global causing different types
of clinical complications with permanent and long term morbidity in humans.
Although huge advances have been made in medical sciences the effectiveness of
available anthelmintics are still quite limited. Starting from the 50’s, most
importance was given to synthetic compounds for developing remedies from them,
however, the traditional knowledge of medicine of different countries continued to
provide us clues against this widespread health problem. Natural products or
structural analogs with diverse structures are always been the major sources for
discovering new therapeutics and in recent past different active compounds have
also been identified form these plant sources having anthelmintic properties.
Although compounds of diverse chemical nature and classes were identified, most active ones belong to
either phenol or terpene in broad chemical nature. The mechanism of action of these phytotherapeutics
is usually multi-targeted and can act against the helminth parasites through diverse spectrum of
activities. In this review we summarized the effective anthelmintics belong to either phenolics or
terpenoids and highlighted the major way of their effectiveness. This also highlights the recent
development of new therapeutic strategies against helminth parasites in the light of recent advances of
knowledge. In addition, developing efficient strategies to promote apoptosis and disturbing redox status
in them by natural products can provide us a clue in antifilarial drug developmental research and crucial
unmet medical need.
