The anti-inflammatory properties of sesquiterpene lactones, substances derived from a number of plants including chrysanthemums, chamomile, daisies and ragweed, were discovered by researchers at Pennington Biomedical Research Center in Baton Rouge, LA and Louisiana State University.
"We are very pleased to add this important piece of intellectual property to our growing portfolio of botanical therapeutics," said Bertold Fridlender, President and CEO of Phytomedics.
"It further helps solidify strong patent protection around PMI-005, one of our important anti-inflammatory botanical drug candidates, and expands our market leadership in the area of developing novel, ethical pharmaceutical products for severe inflammatory disorders of substantial unmet medical need."
Phytomedics aims to occupy a pharmaceutical niche that it says allows for the development of heterogenous plant derived products as ethical drugs in the US.
"Through state-of- the-art, proprietary approaches, Phytomedics' botanical therapeutics program reconnects plants and human health at a new level of technological sophistication," it said.
Scientific attention has also been drawn to the purported anti-cancer effects of SLs. A review of the evidence linking them to cancer prevention was published in the May issue of Current Medicinal Chemistry - Anti-Cancer Agents, focusing on four important issues: the structure-activity relationship of SLs; experimental evidence for the anti-cancer function of SLs obtained from both in vitro cell culture and in vivo animal models; molecular mechanisms involved in the anti-cancer activity of SLs; and SLs that are considered important thanks to their anti-cancer activities and their potential use in the development of anti-cancer drugs.
"Taken together, many SLs are emerging as promising anticancer agents with potential applications in both cancer chemotherapy and chemoprevention," wrote the researchers from the National University of Singapore.