Anti-leishmanial and Anti-inflammatory Agents from Endophytes: A Review

摘要

Natural productshave and will continue to offer exceptional chemical diversity with a wide biological activities spectrum. They have been so far the most promising sources for drug discovery and development [1, 2]. According to Newman and Cragg [3] and Katz and Baltz [4], over 50% of all agents currently in clinical use are either natural products or natural product derived. The use of these products as medicines is ancient since for centuries, health practices have incorporated the medicinal properties of products from diverse sources, particularly microbial species. The modern discovery of penicillin and streptomycin led to the recognition of microbial natural products as one of the most powerful and prolific sources for drug lead discovery over the past seven decades [5]. Indeed, the rates of discovery for new drugs dramatically dropped since the year's nineties because many pharmaceutical companies stopped their natural products programmes in profit of high-throughput screening of synthetic chemicals [4].