Promising Phytochemicals from Indian Medicinal Plants

The medicinal plants find application in pharmaceutical, cosmetic, agricultural and food industry. The use of the medicinal herbs for curing disease has been documented in history of all civilizations. With the onset of research, it was concluded that plants contain active principles, which are responsible, for curative action of the herbs. Ayurvedic drugs are used in crude forms like expressed juice, powder, decoction or infusion. Ancient healers, developed formulations based on medicinal herbs, were probably not aware about the chemical composition of the herbs. But the advancement they made despite non-availability of scientific procedures is astonishing. Scientific research has proved the utility of time tested remedies. The article reviews work done on isolated constituents of rare Indian medicinal plants.