Bioprospecção de espécies amazônicas da família Lauraceae com potencial aromático e medicinal

Abstract

The Amazon is one of the largest possessors of plant biodiversity on the planet. The constituents of the flora have enormous potential in the pharmaceutical, cosmetics, perfumes and essences, among others. This study aimed to search for Amazonian species of the Lauraceae potentially useful both therapeutically and commercially, holding alkaloidal composition or aromatic potential. The selected species were collected in Adolpho Ducke Forest Reserve, for this study were: Aniba panurensis, Aniba rosaeodora, Dicypellium manausense, Endlicheria chalisea, Licaria cannella angustata, Licaria martiniana, Mezilaurus duckei, Mezilaurus itauba, Ocotea nigrescens, Ocotea splendens, Rhodostemonodaphne negrensis, Rhodostemonodaphne parvifolia, Pleurothyrium vasquezii e Sextonia rubra. Of the species selected the ones with some chemical study are A. rosaeodora, A. panurensis and M. itauba. The essential oils were obtained by hydrodistillation and analyzed for their chemical composition (GC-FID, GC-MS and 1H NMR), where the -caryophyllene was the major constituent of most oils: leaves of A. panurensis (33.5%), D. manausense (39.5%), M. itauba (51.8%), O. nigrescens (37.9%) and O. splendens (51.0%); leaves and branches of L. martiniana (41.7% and 21.4%, respectively) and R. parvifolia (41.3% and 16.2%, respectively). For the other major oils constituents were caryophyllene epoxide, santalenone, -eudesmol, -pinene, germacrene D, p-cymene, -elemene, -copaene and linalool (89.4%) which is the main substance found in species A. rosaeodora. When testing inhibitory activity of free radicals, all essential oils showed inhibition of free radical DPPH qualitatively. However, quantitative analyses of active concentrations were very high, exceeding 700 g/mL. Only the essential oils of branches of L. martiniana and leaves of M. duckei and R. parvifolia showed inhibitory activity of acetylcholinesterase. Tests of platelet inhibition resulted in little potential antiplatelet agent with inhibition below 20%. Extracts of the genus Aniba, Licaria, Mezilaurus, Ocotea and Rhodostemonodaphne obtained by extraction with ethanol 100%, were subjected to phytochemical screening in which the presence of phenols, tannins, flavanones, saponins, steroids and alkaloids were shown to be frequent. The ethanol extracts of the species of A. panurensis, S. rubra and L. martiniana showed the highest antioxidant activity against DPPH free radical. The acetylcholinesterase inhibitory activity was higher in extracts of the Aniba and Licaria genus. Extracts of the Licaria genus were showed better activities against tumor cells SF-295 (human glioblastoma), HCT-8 (human colon) and MDAMB-435 (human breast). And for the bioassays against Leishmania amazonensis and Trypanosoma cruzi extract of leaves of A. panurensis showed the best activity (67 g/mL e 79 g/mL, respectively). The extracts that showed better biological activities should be fractionated for the isolation of active principles and retested