Natural Product and Biodiversity

Biodiversity the diversity of living forms has attracted a great deal of interest and concern since biological resources constitute an asset with a great deal of immediate as well as potential benefits for the quality of life. The decline in biodiversity is largely due to human activities such as drastic transformation of natural landscapes and deforestation. These phenomena cause a serious threat to sustainable development.  At present in many industrialized nations, fifty per cent of all prescribed drugs are derived or synthesized from natural products, the only available sources are animals, marine, plants, and micro-organisms. It is considered that the structural and biological diversity of their constituents offer a unique and renewable resource for discovering of potential new drugs and biological entities. Medicinal Chemistry research on extracts from plants and other living organisms that lead to the discovery of new therapeutic agents can also be an important factor towards maintaining of biodiversity.