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Alkaloids

Alkaloids are a class of naturally occurring organic compounds that contain nitrogen and can be extracted from plants and other organisms. They have a wide range of pharmacological activities and many have traditional medical uses or have been used as starting points for drug discovery, while some have recreational or entheogenic uses. The name 'alkaloids' comes from the Latin root for alkali and the Greek suffix for 'like'.

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33 views2 pages

Alkaloids

Alkaloids are a class of naturally occurring organic compounds that contain nitrogen and can be extracted from plants and other organisms. They have a wide range of pharmacological activities and many have traditional medical uses or have been used as starting points for drug discovery, while some have recreational or entheogenic uses. The name 'alkaloids' comes from the Latin root for alkali and the Greek suffix for 'like'.

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vijay kumar honnali
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© © All Rights Reserved
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Alkaloid

The first individual alkaloid, morphine, was isolated


in 1804 from the opium poppy (Papaver somniferum). [1]

Alkaloids are a class of basic, naturally occurring organic compounds that contain at
least one nitrogen atom. This group also includes some related compounds with
neutral[2] and even weakly acidic properties.[3] Some synthetic compounds of similar
structure may also be termed alkaloids.[4] In addition to carbon, hydrogen and nitrogen,
alkaloids may also contain oxygen or sulfur. More rarely still, they may contain elements
such as phosphorus, chlorine, and bromine.[5]

Alkaloids are produced by a large variety of organisms including bacteria, fungi, plants,
and animals.[6] They can be purified from crude extracts of these organisms by acid-base
extraction, or solvent extractions followed by silica-gel column chromatography.
[7]
Alkaloids have a wide range of pharmacological activities
including antimalarial (e.g. quinine), antiasthma (e.g. ephedrine), anticancer (e.g. homo
harringtonine),[8] cholinomimetic (e.g. galantamine),[9] vasodilatory (e.g. vincamine), antiar
rhythmic (e.g. quinidine), analgesic (e.g. morphine),[10] antibacterial (e.g. chelerythrine),[11]
and antihyperglycemic activities (e.g. piperine).[12][failed verification] Many have found use
in traditional or modern medicine, or as starting points for drug discovery. Other
alkaloids possess psychotropic (e.g. psilocin) and stimulant activities
(e.g. cocaine, caffeine, nicotine, theobromine),[13] and have been used
in entheogenic rituals or as recreational drugs. Alkaloids can be toxic too
(e.g. atropine, tubocurarine).[14] Although alkaloids act on a diversity of metabolic
systems in humans and other animals, they almost uniformly evoke a bitter taste.[15]

The boundary between alkaloids and other nitrogen-containing natural compounds is


not clear-cut.[16] Compounds like amino acid peptides, proteins, nucleotides, nucleic
acid, amines, and antibiotics are usually not called alkaloids.[2] Natural compounds
containing nitrogen in the exocyclic position (mescaline, serotonin, dopamine, etc.) are
usually classified as amines rather than as alkaloids.[17] Some authors, however,
consider alkaloids a special case of amines.[18][19][20]

Naming[edit]

The article that introduced the concept of "alkaloid".


The name "alkaloids" (German: Alkaloide) was introduced in 1819 by German
chemist Carl Friedrich Wilhelm Meissner, and is derived from late Latin root alkali and
the Greek-language suffix -οειδής -('like').[nb 1] However, the term came into wide use only
after the publication of a review article, by Oscar Jacobsen in the chemical dictionary
of Albert Ladenburg in the 1880s.[21][22]

There is no unique method for naming alkaloids.[23] Many individual names are formed by
adding the suffix "ine" to the species or genus name.[24] For example, atropine is isolated
from the plant Atropa belladonna; strychnine is obtained from the seed of the Strychnine
tree (Strychnos nux-vomica L.).[5] Where several alkaloids are extracted from one plant
their names are often distinguished by variations in the suffix: "idine", "anine", "aline",
"inine" etc. There are also at least 86 alkaloids whose names contain the root "vin"
because they are extracted from vinca plants such as Vinca rosea (Catharanthus
roseus);[25] these are called vinca alkaloids

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