Nepali chemists discovered two new compounds from Simal (Bombax ceiba L.)

Nepali chemists have discovered two new compounds from the stem bark of a plant popularly known in Nepal as Simal. The discovery of the new compounds (Simalin A and Simalin B) has recently been published in a journal Phytochemistry Letters. The plant material was collected from Darchula, Nepal and the research was carried out in Kumamoto University, Kumamoto, Japan.

Simal is a deciduous tree found in Nepal, India, West China and Malaysia.  Bark of this plant is used in wound healing; flowers and fruits are used in revitalizing sexual impotency and gum is used as remedy of diarrhea, dysentery, influenza and menorrhagia. 

Joshi et al., obtained Simalin A (molecular formula determined: C20H28O14) as a colorless gum with positive optical rotation, whereas Simalin B (molecular formula determined: C26H40O17) was obtained as colorless gum with negative optical rotation First author of the paper is pursuing PhD at
Graduate School of Pharmaceutical Sciences, Kumamoto University, Kumamoto, Japan with funding from Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology (MEXT) of Japan. He is an assistant professor of chemistry at Pokhara University, Pokhara, Nepal.

Fig. 1. Structure of newly discovered compounds 1. Simalin A and 2. Simalin B

According to a expert in natural product chemistry, further characterization and biological assays of these new compounds are necessary to understand the medicinal role of these compounds.  

Further reading: K.R. Joshi et al., Phytochemistry Letters 7 (2014) 26–29