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  Home > JCE Print > Journal of Chemical Education > Issues > 1997  > July  >
Chemistry Everyday for Everyone
Products of Chemistry
Medicines and Drugs from Plants
William C. Agosta
Cover
July 1997
Vol. 74 No. 7
p. 857
Abstract
Natural preparations have been used for thousands of ages for a variety of purposes including as medicines, poisons, and psychotropic drugs. The largest grouped of preparations from living organisms are medicines, and historically these have come from plants. Quinine and aspirin are two examples of medicines which were extracted originally from plants. Mind-altering, or psychotropic, drugs come mostly from plants or fungi. In many traditional cultures, sickness and death are attributed to maligned spirits so that medicine and religion become inseparable. Uses of cohohba, snakeplant, coca, and peyote are discussed. The process by which new pharmaceuticals are discovered from natural products is described. The implications of an agreement between a major pharmaceutical company and a country in the tropics are discussed.
More Information
*  Citation
 Agosta, William C. J. Chem. Educ. 1997 74 857.
*  Keywords
 Organic Chemistry, Drugs/Pharmaceuticals, Medicinal Chemistry, Natural Products, Plant Chemistry, Public Understanding/Appreciation
*  History
 Created:
Last Updated:		 July 28, 1999
June 23, 2005
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