The schweinfurthins: issues in the development of a plant-derived anticancer lead

Abstract

The development of a natural product into a pharmaceutical drug product can follow a long and tortuous path in the best of cases. This chapter highlights issues that have arisen in the development of the schweinfurthins, a compound class discovered from an African plant, Macaranga schweinfurthii, as a potential cancer drug lead. Resupply of the plant from Cameroon, synthetic access to this series of compounds, and investigation of its mechanism of action, have all played major roles in the story to date. An interdisciplinary network of scientific collaboration has been assembled to make advancement possible