Plants provide a rich source of novel biologically active compounds. Biological and chemical screenings are complementary approaches for the rapid detection and isolation of interesting new plant constituents. Biological screening followed by activity-guided fractionation has been used successfully in our laboratories for the discovery of antifungal, larvicidal and molluscicidal compounds. High performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) coupled to UV spectroscopy (LC/UV), mass spectrometry (LC/MS) and nuclear magnetic resonance (LC/NMR) has proved to be highly efficient for the chemical screening of crude plant extracts. In particular LC/MS and LC/MS/MS used with different ionisation techniques such as thermospray (TSP), continuous flow-FAB (CF-FAB) and electrospray (ES) have proved to be very efficient for the early recognition of molluscicidal saponins in Swartzia madagascariensis and Phytolacca dodecandra. The combination of LC/UV/NMR/MS was of great value for the investigation of polyphenols and bitter principles in Gentianaceae species. Among other examples, LC/NMR analysis of the antifungal crude extract of the African plant Swertia calycina is presented.
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Hostettmann et al. (1997) studied this question.
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