Chemical constituents of the Stem Bark of Acacia ataxacantha (Fabaceae) doi.org/10.26538/tjnpr/v2i8.2

Abstract

Medicinal plants have served as source of lead discovery in drug development. Human protein kinases represent the third largest enzyme class and are responsible for modifying an estimated one-third of human proteome. Numerous tyrosine kinases inhibitors have been discovered by screening plant extracts based on ethnopharmacological and chemotaxonomic knowledge.
Specific screening approach have led to the isolation of structurally distinct classes of inhibitors which have served as leads for further design and synthesis of more active analogues. The purpose of this work is to screen phytochemically the constituents of Acacia ataxacantha as part of our continuous study on the Phytoconstituents of the genus Acacia for protein kinase inhibitory agents. The chloroform extract of the stem bark was subjected to silica gel column chromatography and the eluates were monitored using thin layer chromatography leading to the isolation of compounds 1 and 2. Nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy (NMR) and mass
spectrometry (MS) were used to elucidate the structures of the isolated compounds. Compound 1 was isolated as a pale white solid, and its spectral data was consistent with that of lup-20(29)-en3β-ol (lupenol), while compound 2 was found to be stigmasta-7, 22 dien-3β-ol (α-spinasterol) by comparing its spectral data with literature. This is the first report of these compounds from Acacia ataxacantha.