A New Biflavonoid Glycoside from the Leaves of Ziziphus mucronata Willd. (Rhamnaceae)

The use of natural products especially plants for healing is as ancient and universal as medicine itself because they have been an integral part of the ancient traditional medicine systems such as the Chinese, Ayurvedic and Egyptian systems of medicine. Natural products are known to possess several phytochemicals responsible for their pharmacological activities or acts as the precursor for the synthesis of novel drugs. Even now, continuous traditions of natural product therapy exist throughout the third world, especially in the occident, where numerous minerals, animal substances and plants are still in common use. One of such plants is Ziziphus mucronata of the rhamnaceae family. It is commonly known as buffalo thorn and is a spiny shrub or small to medium-sized tree that grows up to 20 m high with a spreading canopy. The leaves are used in African traditional medicine for the treatment of diarrhoea, tumour, cough, sores, ear inflammation, asthma, syphilis, gonorrhoea, measles, fever and psychiatric disorder. Phytochemical screening of the methanol extract of the leaves had revealed the presence of saponins, flavonoids, tannins, triterpenes and steroids; catechins and triterpenoids were previously isolated from the leaves of the plant. The ethnomedicinal use of the leaves in the treatment of pain and inflammation was recently validated scientifically. Despite its varied medicinal potentials, there is paucity of information on the isolation and characterization of bioactive compounds from this plant; only the isolation of cyclopeptides have been reported in the scientific database. In continuation of our work aimed at isolating the principles responsible for the observed diverse biological activities, we present herein, the isolation