Phytochemical investigations of Tribulus terrestris and Solanum torvum by FT-IR analysis

Medicinal plant research includes much more than the discovery of new drugs. This field has been expanded to also include diverse subjects as negotiation of power based on medicinal plant knowledge (Garro,1986). Plants generally contain both primary metabolites as well as secondary metabolites. The different phytoconstituents present in plants include anthraglycosides, arbutin, bitter drugs, flavonoids, alkaloids, saponins, coumarins, phenol carboxylic acids, terpenes and valepotriates. These phytoconstituents confer specific characteristics and properties of plants. Therefore, the analysis of these constituents would help in determining various biological activities of plants. Natural products, either as pure compounds or as standardized plant extracts, provide unlimited opportunities for new drug (Parekh and Chanda, 2007). It is one of the most widely used methods to identify the chemical constituents and elucidate the structural compounds and has been used as a requisite method to identify medicines in pharmacopoeia of many countries. However, some adulterants come out in the medicinal market along with the high value medicinal materials. At present, the chromatography is the main tool used to identify the adulterants from the medicinal materials and extract products based on the chemical profile. It is well known that the medicinal materials comprise hundreds of components, and produce their curative effects through mutual effects of many ingredients, so the limited numbers of specific components cannot availably reflect the real qualities of the herbal Phytochemical investigations of Tribulus terrestris and Solanum torvum by FT-IR analysis