Amides From Plants: Structures and Biological Importance

Natural products and their derivatives represent more than 50% of the drugs in clinical use in the world and amides are one of them. Amides constitute an important class of plant secondary metabolites and are involved in their development and their defense against environmental stresses. Their importance lies in their biological activities like antitumor, anthelmintic, antispasmodic, antifungal, antibacterial, insecticidal, and herbicidal activities. In this chapter, amides of plant origin have been classified on the basis of amine moiety present in the molecule and an overview of the isolation, structure, and biological activities of these natural products is described. Isobutyl amine, phenylethyl amine, piperidine, pyrrolidine, putrescine, spermidine, and tryptamine are the predominant amine components of natural amides, which are mainly distributed in Piperaceae and Rutaceae families. Several sulfur-containing amides are also described which have been found to show antifungal and insecticidal activities.