[MPWG] NEWS: Evolutionary trees of traditional medicine plants provide hints for drug-makers

[Olivia Kwong]

http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/notrocketscience/2012/09/11/evolutionary-trees-of-traditional-medicine-plants-provide-hints-for-drug-makers/

Evolutionary trees of traditional medicine plants provide hints for drug-makers
September 11th, 2012 by Ed Yong in Medicine & health, Neuroscience and
psychology, Plants

There’s a bizarre mindset that divides medicine into “natural” (made
from plants; untainted by villainous pharmaceutical companies;
delivered to your veins by forest animals) and everything else
(“man-made” pills fashioned from profits and poisons). The reality, of
course, is that many of the drugs used in our hospitals and pharmacies
come from plants. Willow bark contains salicylic acid, the main
ingredient in aspirin. Paclitaxel (taxol) was isolated from the bark
of the Pacific yew tree; today, it is used to stop cancer cells from
dividing.  The rose periwinkle has given us vinblastine and
vincristine, both used to treat leukaemia.

See the link above for the full article text.