Society for Medicinal Plant ResearchGesellschaft für Arzneipflanzenforschung e.V.

NEWSLETTER

NEWSLETTER

Dear members,

the 55th annual congress of GA has been held inGraz, Austria, from Sept 2nd – 6th 2007. One of thehighlights was the opening lecture by Prof. Dr.H.R.H. Princess Chulabhorn Mahidol fromBangkok, Thailand. But also the plenary andkeynote lecturers, as well as the presenters inworkshops, short lecture and poster sessions con-tributed to the success of the congress. During thecongress, Prof. Dr. Alessandra Braca, University ofPisa, has been announced as the winner of theEgon Stahl award in silver 2007. Moreover, 34travel grants have been awarded to students and12 to post docs from developing countries.

With about 900 participants it has so far been thebiggest GA congress. I am very pleased that theGA annual meetings are so well accepted and thatour society has developed to a globally leading so-ciety in the field. The new policy to include the con-gress dinner in the registration fee was also a bigsuccess, since 670 persons, young and old, jointlycelebrated a wonderful Styrian evening.

I want to thank my co-workers and everybody whocontributed to the organisation of the congressvery much. I am also very greatful to the sponsorswho allowed to keep the fees relatively small. Theca. 760 abstracts of the presentations have againbeen published in Planta Medica, the official organof our Society. I want to thank the publisher,Thieme Verlag Stuttgart, Dr. Kuhlmann, and the is-

Message from the President

2007, No. 2

sue-editor Prof. Franz Bucar very much for all theirefforts and for the good collaboration. A compre-hensive report on the 55th annual congress of GAin Graz can be found in this Newsletter.

As you have been informed, we succeeded to ne-gotiate with Thieme a low rate on-line access toPlanta Medica articles for members of GA. I hopethat this service will intensively be used and thatmore members will consider Planta Medica for thepublication of their valuable results in the future.

During the member’s meeting in Graz, the BoD ofGA has newly been elected. The detailed results ofthe elections are also published in this Newsletter.Prof. Brigitte Kopp has been elected as the newpresident of GA. I want to congratulate her verymuch and wish her a successful presidency. Prof.Blaschek and me have been elected as vice pres-idents, Dr. Seitz for secretary and Dr. Roether asthe new treasurer. I want to thank all colleaguesfrom the previous ExC and Advisory Board verymuch for the continuously good collaboration andsupport. It has always been a pleasure to work withsuch a good team. Special thanks to Prof. Wolf-gang Kreis who acted as vice-president for fouryears and as Advisory Board member for manyyears, and to Prof. Chlodwig Franz and Prof. PeterHoughton, who did not candidate anymore. I wishthe new team a fruitful collaboration and great suc-cess.

In 2008, the 56th annual congress of GA will beheld within the 7th Joint Meeting in Athens, Greece.It will be organized by Prof. Leandros Skaltsounison behalf of AFERP together with GA, ASP, PSEand SIF (Soc. Ital. Fitochimca).

Last but not least I want to say good bye as presi-dent of GA. It was an honour to serve GA in thisway for six years and I want to thank everybody forhis/her support and trust.I wish you a healthy, lucky and successful year2008 and I am looking forward to seeing many ofyou in Athens.

Cordially

Rudolf BauerGA President

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Egon-Stahl-Award in Gold andBronze 2008 andDr. Willmar Schwabe Award 2008

Egon-Stahl-Award in Gold

The Egon Stahl-Award in Gold is the high-est scientific honour of the Society for Me-dicinal Plant Research (GA). It acknow-ledges the outstanding scientific lifetimework of a research scientist who has beenclosely attached to Pharmaceutical Biology(Pharmacognosy, Chemistry of NaturalProducts), in its whole range, through hisscientific work.The Egon Stahl-Award in Gold is endowedwith a goldmedal and with Euro 5000. Theprize will be awarded during the annualcongress of the Society for Medicinal PlantResearch (2008: Joint meeting withAFERP, ASP, PSE and SIF, Aug 3–8 inAthens, Greece).Nominations can be made by all regularmembers of the Society for Medicinal PlantResearch. Self nominations can not beconsidered.The following must be enclosed with thenomination:A detailed acknowledgment of the scientificworks and names of further experts whocould be consulted. Nominations must besubmitted to the coming president of theSociety for Medicinal Plant Research, Prof.Dr. B. Kopp, Vienna, by March 1, 2008

Egon Stahl-Award in Bronze

On the occasion of his 60th birthday, Pro-fessor Dr. Dr. h.c. mult. Egon Stahl donateda medal, a document and a monetary prizein order to recognize and promote youngscientists working in the field of Pharma-cognosy (Pharmaceutical Biology) and An-alytical Phytochemistry.The bronze medal and an award of € 1500will be given to a young scholar up to theage of about thirty whose thesis is of out-standing quality.In 2008 the ESA will be awarded during thejoint meeting of GA with AFERP, ASP, PSEand SIF in Athens, Greece, Aug 3–8, 2008.Members of the Society for Medicinal PlantResearch are invited to submit nominationsfor candidates together with supportingdata to the coming president of GA, Prof.Dr. Brigitte Kopp, Vienna.A nomination for the prize has to include acurriculum vitae incorporating the candi-date’s scientific career, an index on her/hispublications, and reprints of several ofhis/her more recent publications. All publi-cations can be taken into consideration.All documents have to be submitted in trip-licate. Deadline for submissions is March15, 2008

Notes to all GA members

(to our knowledge)

Prof. Dr. Max von Schantz(Honorary member)

The Society will keepcommemoration of

Prof. von Schantz and offers itssincere condolences.

(see also page 3)

Please inform the secretaryby phone, fax or mail

of any changein your coordinates,

especially in case of changesin E-mail addresses.

Fax / phone: ++49 8141 613 749

e-mail:Ga-secretary@ga-online.org

The GA-homepage (www.ga-online.org) contains a special membersarea for which an access code

is needed: username “gamember”,password “morphine”.

All contributions for theGA-Newsletter are welcome.

Deadline for submission is fixedto May 30th 2008.

Please send all contributionsby e-mail:

Prof. Dr. A. HenselUniversity of Münster, Institute

for Pharmaceutical Biologyand Phytochemistry,

Hittorfstrasse 56,D-48149 Münster, Germanyahensel@uni-muenster.de

Editorial remarkNote to all GA members Deceased members

The Society informs

Dr. Willmar Schwabe Award ofthe Society for Medicinal PlantResearch

The Dr. Willmar Schwabe Award acknowl-edges outstanding results of pharmacolog-ical and/or clinical research in the field ofherbal medicinal products. The award isendowed with 10000 € sponsored by Dr.Willmar Schwabe GmbH, Karlsruhe (Ger-many).The aim of the award is to motivate scien-tists to resolve phytotherapeutical and phy-topharmaceutical problems in an interdisci-plinary approach.Research groups and scientists of universi-ties and other non-commercial scientific in-stitutions are entitled to apply.Up to three relevant scientific publicationson a specific topic which have been pub-lished during the last three years can beconsidered. They must be submitted to-gether with CV(s) and list(s) of publicationsto the coming president of the Society forMedicinal Plant Research Prof. Dr. BrigitteKopp, Vienna, in printed form in fivecopies until April 15, 2008.The Dr. Willmar Schwabe Award will be be-stowed during the joint meeting of GA withAFERP, ASP, PSE, SIF, in Athens, Greece,Aug 3–8, 2008.

Prof. Dr. R. Bauer, President of GA

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Notes from the Society

On 25 November 2007 Professor Dr. Dr.h.c. Max von Schantz, honorary member ofthe Society for Medicinal Plant Researchsince 1987, passed away.Prof. von Schantz was born on 20 January1922 in Helsinki, Finland. After his matricu-lation examination in 1940 in Turku, Fin-land, he started to study natural sciences atthe Åbo ‘Akademi’ in Turku and graduatedfrom there as a Master of Science in 1949.In the same year, he also graduated as aBachelor of Science (Pharmacy) at the Uni-versity of Helsinki, and in 1951 as a Masterof Science in Pharmacy, also in Helsinki. In1954 he obtained a Licentiate degree inNatural Sciences at the University of Turku,and in 1958, his dissertation for the Doctor-ate in Philosophy was approved by the Uni-versity of Turku. In addition to his academicpursuits at the University of Turku, during1951 to 1954 he was sequentially an assis-tant in the Divisions of Pharmacognosy,Chemistry and Pharmaceutical Chemistryat the Department of Pharmacy (Universityof Helsinki). He was awarded an associateprofessorship in Pharmacognosy (1955-1957), and was acting professor (1957-1960). In December 1960, he was invitedand appointed as a full professor in Phar-macognosy. For thirty years he held thechair in Pharmacognosy and during the lasttwo decades in this position, he simultane-ously acted as Head of the Department ofPharmacy (University of Helsinki), until hisretirement in 1987.Because of his unusual strengths in thenatural sciences, e.g. chemistry, biology,botany and pharmaceutical sciences, hewas ideally suited to educate and encour-age young aspiring scientists and to driveforward scientific endeavours which duringthat epoch were entirely innovative in thefield of pharmacy. He intensively followedthe development of emerging technologies,for instance, in novel separation tech-niques. At that time a young talented re-searcher carrying out his research at theUniversity of Karlsruhe, Dr. Egon Stahl,had just created a new separation tech-nique, namely thin layer chromatography.Professor von Schantz had recognized theimportance of this technique and immedi-ately started to correspond with Dr. Stahl toexplore the application of this completely

new technique in natural products re-search. Dr. Stahl pronounced to the thenPh.D. student von Schantz in the middle of1950s “This new technique will have an ex-tremely high importance in separation tech-niques in the future”. Professor vonSchantz incorporated this technology in hisstudies of volatile oils and specificallyAcorus calamus L. – the theme of his doc-toral dissertation.In the early 1960s, once the first generationof commercial devices were readily avail-able, he thereafter incorporated the appli-cation of gas chromatography in his volatileoil research. He was amongst the first sci-entists in Finland to introduce the hyphen-ated technique of gas chromatography andmass spectrometry (GC-MS). He envis-aged the importance of such techniques inthe field of pharmacognosy, and this wasagain the beginning of a new epoch in re-search, which would also influence teach-ing in the Department of Pharmacy.After the completion of his doctoral disser-tation, his interests principally centered onplant volatile oils, from members of sub-classes (Coniferous trees) and familiessuch as Asteraceae and Lamiaceae withemphasis not only upon analytical studiesbut also on the elucidation of the biosyn-thetic terpene pathways. In addition he wasalso interested in, and intensively studied,non-volatile plant secondary metabolites,e.g. steroids, saponins, phloroglucinols,anthroquinones, alkaloids, phenylpropanederivatives, flavonoids etc. Furthermore, hepursued his interests in plant breeding, e.g.selective breeding of Vicia faba L. in orderto improve L-dopa production and thecross-breeding of summer turnip rape(Brassica campestris L. var. annua) to alterthe fatty acid content and composition.As Head of the Division of Pharmacognosyand the Department of Pharmacy, Profes-sor von Schantz did not forget the impor-tance of other departmental divisions andensured they had sufficient resources tostrengthen and expand their role within theDepartment of Pharmacy. In addition tothis, he inspired young researchers in theirwork, and developed a strong internationalcollaboration between leading universitydepartments and institutes.

Throughout his academic career ProfessorMax von Schantz was extremely hardworking; his enthusiasm was complete notonly for the science of his chosen subject,pharmacognosy, but also for the adminis-trative tasks associated with running a De-partment of Pharmacy.Professor von Schantz was a board mem-ber of a number of scientific societies in-cluding the ‘Akademi’ of Finland (ResearchCouncil for Natural Sciences), the FinnishSociety of Young Researchers and Teach-ers (Chairman), and the Finnish Society ofEntomology (Associate Chairman). In addi-tion, he has been a long-time member ofthe Society for Medicinal Plant Research,to which he was awarded the position ofhonorary Member in 1987.It is truly amazing that despite his devotionto the Division of Pharmacognosy and theDepartment of Pharmacy, Professor vonSchantz was also an expert in entomology,especially in the group of Microlepidoptera.During his academic career Professor Maxvon Schantz published more than 200 orig-inal articles within the scientific disciplinesof chemistry, pharmacognosy and entomol-ogy, two books, hundreds of congress pre-sentations, posters, proceedings, and nu-merous articles in non-scientific journals.

We have lost a great and enthusiasticteacher, mentor and a faithful friend, butwill always remember him for these quali-ties.

Prof. Dr. Raimo Hiltunen, Helsinki;Prof. Dr. R. Bauer (president)

Obituary: Prof. Dr. Max von Schantz (1922 to 2007)

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Professor Dr. Ewald Sprecher, Hamburg, 85 years

Professor Dr. Ewald Sprecher, honorarymember of the GA since 1995, celebratedhis 85thbirthday on November 17th 2007. Aspresident of the GA in 1988/89, as Vice-President for 8 years and as a long-stand-ing member of the advisory board he hasdedicated extensive and devoted service tothe GA. He brought his detailed knowledgeof GA into the excellent chronicle of the GAwhich appeared on the occasion of the 50thanniversary of the society in April 2003. Hehas been and still is a very reliable partici-pant at the annual meetings from the be-ginning of the GA together with his wifeHelga. Together they now enjoy the au-

tumn of their lives in their house full of won-derful books and mementos from theirmany interesting journeys in Europe andabroad. After an admirable life committedto science, teaching and intensive inter-change with colleagues and friends, he de-serves the pleasure of looking back on hispersonal achievements with satisfaction.The GA congratulates him on his birthdayand wishes him and his wife vigour andhealth for the years to come.

Prof. Dr. E. Stahl-Biskup;Prof. Dr. R. Bauer (president)

Professor Dr. Gerhard Franz, Regensburg, 70 years

Professor Dr. Gerhard Franz, honorarymember of GA celebrated his 70th birthdayon March 26th 2007. Prof. Franz has beenpresident of GA from 1994 to 1997 and al-ways active in pushing forward GA towardsa modern society with international flair.Gerhard Franz held the chair of Pharma-ceutical Biology at the University of Re-gensburg, Germany, since 1977, where heretired in 2004. His research was based onmanyfold aspects of modern pharmacog-nosy, starting from biosynthetic questionsover carbohydrate analysis to immunomod-ulary-, anti-inflammatory- and anti-coagu-lant polysaccharides. He became moreand more interested in quality aspects ofherbal medicinal products. A major interestwas and still is the development of modernquality monographs for the German andEuropean Pharmacopoeia. In Strasbourghe still acts as member of the European

Pharmacopoeia Commission and as chair-man of the Expert Group 13B Phytochem-istry. In 2006 he was awarded with the hon-orary membership of GA in recognition ofhis extraordinary contributions to medicinalplant research, his great impact on the de-velopment of modern herbal monographsfor the pharmacopoeias and his long andintense engagement for the aims of our So-ciety. His efforts to promote quality and ap-plication of herbal medicinal products havebeen acknowledged by the German Gov-ernment and by high-impact awards of dif-ferent scientific societies.The GA congratulates him on his birthdayand wishes him and his wife vigour andhealth for the next years.

Prof. Dr. A. Hensel;Prof. Dr. R. Bauer (president)

Professor Dr. Elisabeth Stahl-Biskup, Hamburg, 60 years and retirement

Professor Dr. Elisabeth Stahl-Biskup cele-brated her 60th birthday at January 14th2007. In March 2007 she retired from theactive academic life at University of Ham-burg after successful research and an im-mense education of many generations ofstudents after 35 years.Professor Stahl-Biskup studied Pharmacyand did her PhD in 1975 on the nature anddistribution of volatile oils within Lami-aceae, especially within the thyme genus.This subject was the main point of her ha-bilitation in 1982. Since 1984 she was pro-fessor at University of Hamburg. Manyphytochemical publications and several re-search-associated books, but also somefamous textbooks are significant markersof a highly productive work. Especially thebook “Anatomie und Histologie der Samen-

pflanzen” for enabling an effective micro-scopic identification and purity control ofherbal materials can be assessed as stan-dard text book within the pharmacognosticeducation of pharmacists, but it is also inheavy use within phytopharmaceutical in-dustry. She was always active in writing theofficial comments for the European Phar-macopoeia in order to achieve modern andreliable monographs. Prof. Stahl-Biskupserved GA many years within the advisoryboard and as the former editor of the GAnewsletter. The GA congratulates her onher birthday and wishes her and her hus-band all the best for the next years!

Prof. Dr. A. Hensel;Prof. Dr. R. Bauer (president)

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Retirement of Prof. Dr. Arnold Vlietinck

After his 65th birthday on October 23, 2006Prof. Arnold Jozef Vlietinck celebrated hisofficial retirement from academic duties atUniversity of Antwerp, Belgium, on Sep-tember 30th 2007 after many active years inresearch, students education and regula-tory affairs.Arnold Vlietinck obtained his Pharmacist’sdegree in 1964 at the University of Leuvenand his Ph.D. in Pharmaceutical Sciencesat the same university in 1968. After spe-cialisations in Industrial Pharmacy andDrug Analysis (1969, KULeuven) and Clin-ical Biology (Medical Biochemistry, Microbi-ology and Serology) (1973, KULeuven), heobtained the position of Research Assistantas a Fulbright-Hays, NATO- and WHO-fel-low at the School of Pharmacy, Laboratoryof Biochemistry, University of Wisconsin-Madison, Wisconsin, USA (1973-1974). In1974 he became professor of pharmacog-nosy and phytochemistry at the newlyfounded University of Antwerp (Universi-taire Instelling Antwerpen), and the first di-rector of the Laboratory of Pharmacognosyand Phytochemistry. He started the differ-ent research lines that have turned theLaboratory into a highly performing re-search unit on national an internationallevel, including (a) the pharmacological,chemotherapeutical and biochemical eval-uation of plants used in traditional medi-

cine; (b) the search for new chemothera-peutic (antibacterial, antifungal, antiviraland antiparasitic), insecticidal, immuno-modulating, anti-oxidative, wound-healing,antidiabetic and anti-tumoral substancesfrom plants and other natural sources; (c)structure-activity relationship studies of bio-logically active natural products; and (d)drug analysis and quality control (UV, IR,NMR, MS, GC, GC-MS, HPLC, LC-MS).

Prof. Vlietinck has contributed to the forma-tion of more than 30 promotions of pharma-cists at the University of Antwerp. He is au-thor or co-author of 230 scientific publica-tions in international scientific journals, andan important number of chapters in books,contributions in congress proceedings.More than for any other reason, the impor-tant role Prof. Vlietinck has to be pointedout in the field of quality, safety and efficacyof herbal medicinal products on Europeanand even global level. This expertise wasintegrated by Prof. Vlietinck into the activi-ties of many scientific societies and institu-tional organisations, as the EuropeanPharmacopoeia Commission, ESCOP,EMEA, GA, International Society of Ethno-pharmacology and many other. EspeciallyGA has made great benefits from the inputof Prof. Vlietinck over many years. Nearlyevery GAmember knows the famous work-

shops on regulatory affairs during manyGA conferences organized by him; heserved many years in the advisory boardand in many other cases GA was alwayskeen to profite from his excellent expertise.The Society wishes Prof. Vlietinck all thebest for the next years, best health andmuch time for continuing all activities forwhich the time was sparse during the lastdecades. All the best!

Profs. L. Pieters, A. Hensel,R. Bauer (president)

Retirement of Prof. Winterhoff

On the occasion of Professor Dr. rer. nat.Hilke Winterhoff’s retirement, GAwould liketo acknowledge her merits.Professor Hilke Winterhoff was born onJuly 30, 1941, in Heidelberg, Germany.In 1959 she started studying Biology andChemistry at the Universities of Hamburgand Muenster and received her PhD in Bi-ology in 1966 from the Westfaelische-Wil-helms Universitaet Muenster, Germany.From 1968 to 1969 she was a research as-sistant at the Institute for Human Geneticsof the University of Duesseldorf, Germany,where she helped to establish a Chromo-some Laboratory. In 1969 she joint thegroup of Prof. Dr. Dr. h.c. mult. F. H. Kem-per at the Institute of Pharmacology andToxicology of the Westfaelische-WilhelmsUniversitaet Muenster as a research assis-tant. Her ‘habilitation’ in Pharmacology andToxicology with the topic “Pharmacologicalcharacterization of herbal medicines andnatural products with endocrine activities”followed in 1988. In 1993 she was ap-pointed with an extraordinary Professor-ship of the Westfaelische-Wilhelms Univer-sitaet Muenster.Since 1975 Professor Winterhoff’s re-search focus is on phytotherapy; she dedi-cated her scientific career to the pharmaco-logical profiling of herbal extracts includingrefined fractions and active ingredients.Prof. Winterhoff formed new relationships

between pure scientific research and ther-apeutical applications, resulting in creativeapproaches in the development of newphytotherapeutics over the past years. In55 publications in national and internationaljournals and 12 book chapters ProfessorWinterhoff has made important contribu-tions to the scientific study of medicinalplants. She presented her results on nu-merous national and international confer-ences and was honored in 1978 with theSebastian-Kneipp-Award for her contribu-tion “Pharmacological influence of phy-tomedicines on endocrine organs” as wellas in 1998 with the “Rudolf Fritz WeissAward” of the German Society of Phy-totherapy” together with her colleagues V.Butterweck, F. Petereit and A. Nahrstedt fortheir contribution “Solubilized hypericin andpseudohypericin from Hypericum perfora-tum exert antidepressant activity in theforced swimming test” (Planta Medica1998; 64: 291-294).The professional activities of Prof. Winter-hoff are manifold. For instance, she ismember of the German Commission E,member of GA since 1984, member of theAdvisory Board of GA since 2000, memberof the Board of Directors of the German So-ciety of Phytotherapy, Co-Editor of theZeitschrift fuer Phytotherapie, and chair ofthe working group “Efficacy and Safety”of the Kooperation Phytopharmaka, Bonn,

Germany. Starting in 1996 she also servedas Chair of the permanent committee“Pharmacology” of GA.Professor Winterhoff completes her careerknowing that her life’s work has stimulatedthe scientific community, trained more than60 exceptional graduate students and re-ceived the respect from her closest peersand colleagues in the field of phytotherapyresearch.GA acknowledges her as an outstandingresearcher and wishes her good health andunlimited creativity for many years to come.

Profs. Dr. V. Butterweck,R. Bauer (president)

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Egon-Stahl-Award 2007 for Prof. Dr. Braca, Italy

The Egon-Stahl-Award 2007 with the silvermedal has been awarded to Prof. Dr.Alessandra Braca, Department of Bioor-ganic Chemistry and Biopharmaceuticals,University of Pisa, Italy, in recognition ofher highly valuable contributions to phar-macognosy and analytical phytochemistry,in particular by her outstanding phytochem-ical and pharmacological studies in thefield of natural products with biological,pharmacological and chemotaxonomic in-terest.Prof. Braca has a broad field of research incurrent pharmacognosy, a good and di-verse publication record, and an outstand-ing scientific curriculum. Taking into ac-count the number of publications related toher age, and the personal merits deducedfrom the CV, she is a famous prize winnerof the ESA.Alessandra Braca was born in 1972, andobtained her PhD degree at the Universityof Pisa in 2000. After a stay at the Univer-sity of Calabria, she returned to the Univer-sity of Pisa where she is presently active asassociate professor. She has – also in viewof her age – an outstanding publicationrecord of 74 papers mainly in the field ofbioassay-guided isolation and structureelucidation of natural products, in the lead-ing journals of the field of pharmacognosysuch as Planta Medica, Journal of NaturalProducts, Phytochemical Analysis, Phyto-chemistry etc.It should be pointed out that she is not spe-cialised in a narrow field of research, herpublications cover a wide range of com-pounds and techniques.The panel of judges for the Egon StahlAward decided unanimously that the stud-ies of Prof. Braca are an excellent exampleof an interdisciplinary approach in medici-nal plant research, covering the fields ofpharmacognosy and analytical phytochem-istry, and therefore fully reflect the spirit ofthe Egon Stahl Award.

Prof. Kopp congratulated Prof. Braca andpresented her the silver medal, the docu-ment and the monetary prize.Prof. Braca gave a lecture entitled “Chemi-cal and biological study of secondarymetabolites from medicinal plants”:Despite competition from other drug dis-covery methods, natural products are stillproviding their fare share of new clinicalcandidates and drugs. Natural sources of-fer a wealth of chemically diverse com-pounds that have been evolutionary prese-lected to modulate biochemical pathways.In this way, many natural compounds withinnovative structures, mechanism of action,and different pharmacological activities,were isolated and characterized. In thiscontext chemical and biological studies ofseveral medicinal and food plants werecarried out during the years, leading to theisolation and structural characterization by

extensive spectroscopic methods including1D- (1H, 13C, 13C DEPT, TOCSY, ROESY)and 2D-NMR experiments (DQF-COSY,HOHAHA, HSQC, HMBC), as well asESIMS analysis, of numerous secondarymetabolites with interesting biological activ-ities. In this lecture, constituents obtainedfrom species belonging to various familiessuch as Chrysobalanaceae, Asclepiada-ceae, and Leguminosae were reported.Molecules that showed the most interestingbiological activity were diterpenes, steroi-dal, and triterpenoidal saponins. In the lastfew years, the attention was also focusedon the identification and structural charac-terization of pregnane glycosides throughESIMS, as well as on the rearrangementsof oligosaccharide chains.

Prof. Dr. Brigitte Kopp (vice-president)

Egon-Stahl-Award in Silver for Prof. Dr. Alessandra Braca during the ceremony in Graz,awarded by president Bauer and vice-president Kopp

Honoray doctorates for GA member

On Nov. 9th 2007, Prof. Dr. Dr. h.c. mult.Heinz Schilcher, Prof. em. was venerated

by the Semmelweis University of Buda-pest, Hungary, with the promotion to the

“Doctor honoris causa” in appreciation ofhis merits to medicinal plant research.Congratulations!

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New GA members since June 2007

The Society welcomes you all warmly andwishes that GA may get a platform formany scientific and personal contacts. Allthe best for you and GA is looking forwardto your active participation in all GA events!

M.Sci. Abdulkadir Abubakar, Nigeria; Dr.Abdullahi Yaro, Nigeria; MSc AbubakarNoah Saidu, Nigeria; Mr. Adebayo Aden-eye, Nigeria; Mr. Adeda Micheal Oloyede,Nigeria; Dr. Ahmed Daboob-Mohamed,Libya; Dr. Aliyu Musa, Nigeria; M.Sc.Amos Abolaji, Nigeria; Mr. Andreas Nie-vergelt-Meier, Switzerland; Stud. PharmAnna Maria Baldia, Austria; Dr. AureliaBrezeanu, Romania; Mr. Basden F. C.Okoye, Nigeria; Dr. Bola Oboh, Nigeria;Msc. Chinwendum Alaribe, Nigeria; Prof.Dr. Christoph Schempp, Germany; MDDagoberto Brandao, Brazil; Ms. DanielaHanganu, Romania; Ms. Danieal Bene-dec, Romania; Mr. Edwin Omeje, Nigeria;Ms. Emilija Jovin, Serbia; Prof. Dr. Fatma

Hashem, Egypt; Dr. Ferna Braga, Brazil;Ms. Florentina D. Gatea, Romania; Dr.Fred Nwodo, Nigeria; Ms. Gabriale Tat-ringa, Romania; Dr. erg. Gabriela Paun,Romania; Ms. Georgeta Balica, Romania;MSc. Gloria Mbogo, Tanzania; Mr. God-win Mbaka, Nigeria; Dr. Hedda Sützl-Klein, Austria; Prof. Hee-Juhn Park,South Korea; Dr. Hippolyte KamdemWabo, Cameroon; HND Ian Sherwood,United Kingdom; MSc. Ismaila O. Ishola,Nigeria; Dr. Ivan Cordova, Mexico; MSc.Ivana Beara, Serbia; Dr. Kakasaheb Ma-hadik, India; Dr. Luzimar Ferandez Gon-zaga, Brasil; Dr. Mahmoud Ottai, Egypt;Dr. Manju Gupta, India; Dr. Marcel Duda,Romania; MSc. Mauricio Gonzales, Mex-ico; Ms. Melanie Wiesner, Germany;Dipl.-Ing. Melanie Malszczyk, Germany;Dr. Mohamad Mroueh, Lebanon; Mr. Mo-hamad Bagher Hassanpouraghdam,Iran; Mr. Monde Nyila, South Africa; Prof.Dr. Nahla Sayed Abdel-Azim, Egypt; Dr.

Ning-Sun Yang, Taiwan; Dr. OlayinkaTaiwo Asekun, Nigeria; MSc. Olufunmi-layo Ogunrinola, Nigeria; Mr. OlumideAdebesin, Nigeria; Ms. Onyekachi Iro-anya, Nigeria; Dr. Paul Cox, USA; Dr. Pe-ter Taylor, Venezuela; Ms. Pimolvan Tap-payuthpijarn, Thailand; Dr. Rabab El Dib,Egypt; Ms. Rashmi Kulshrestha, India;Mag.Pharm. Renate Baldia, Austria; Ms.Reyhan Bahtiyarca Bagdat, Turkey; Mr.Roy Upton, USA; Mag. Ruxandra Popes-cu, Austria; Dr. Sabry Mahfouz, Egypt;BSc. Sandra Gallant, Canada; Dr. Sebas-tian Jäger, Germany; MSc. Slavica Ter-zieva, Macedonia; Prof. Dr. SomsakRuchirawat, Thailand; Prof. Dr. SulejmanRedzic, Bosnia-Herzegovina; MSc. Su-montha Vadhanasin, Thailand; MSc.Süra Baykan Erel, Turkey; Dr. TejpalSingh Katiyar, India; Ms. Vesna Tepavce-vic, Serbia; Ms. Viorica Coroiu, Romania;Ms. Wafaa A.-M. Tawfik, Egypt; Dr. YangYe, China; Ms. Yi Lu, Germany

Minutes of the Members’ Meeting 2007 held in Graz, AustriaThe annual Members’ Meeting was held on4 Sept 2007 during the Graz annual con-gress. President Prof. Bauer welcomed the162 participants.

1. Passing of the agendaThe agenda which had been sent out toall members with the invitation in GA NL1-2007 in July 07 was approved unani-mously.

2. Approval of the minutes of theannual Members’ Meeting 2006in Helsinki, FinlandThe minutes of the Members’ Meeting2006 in Helsinki, Finland, were pub-lished in the GA-NL 2/Dec 2006. Theywere accepted from the assembly unan-imously with no remarks.

3. Annual reports3.1 Report of the President

Prof. R. Bauer• On 14. April 2007 Prof. Dr. R.Hegnauer, Honorary member ofGA since 1978 and first ESAGold awardee in 1999, passedaway in the age of 87 years. Theassembly commemorated him ina minute of silence.

• Prof. Bauer congratulated hon-orary members Prof. Otto Sticherto his 70th birthday on 8 October2006, Prof. Max von Schantz forhis 85th birthday on 20 January2007 and Prof. Gerhard Franz forhis 70th birthday on 26 March2007;

• On April 1, 2007, Dr. VolkerChristoffel resigned as treasurerof GA for personal reasons. Thepresident thanked for his impactand enthusiasm. Prof. Blaschek

has taken over the duties of thetreasurer in interim until the elec-tions;

• The Executive Council of GA hadmeetings on Febr 2 and on July 22007 in Vienna, the BoD meet-ings were held on 2 March 2007in Düsseldorf and on 1 Sept.2007 in Graz.

• Based on a workshop of the BoDon the future of GA, which tookplace in Helsinki last year, someprojects and decisions were initi-ated:

– The BoD proposed a new nameof our Society: Society for Medic-inal Plant and Natural ProductResearch – Gesellschaft für Arz-neipflanzen- und Naturstoff-For-schung (GA).

– A new travel grant for post docsfrom countries with reducedmembership fees; 10000 € forthis and 10000 € for the regularstudents’ TG were both fixed inthe budget of 2007; 12 travelgrants for postdocs from devel-oping countries and 34 for stu-dents were awarded for the con-gress in Graz (TG board for both:Th. Schnidt (chair), Luc Pieters,Anna Rita Bilia). The new cate-gory of TGs shall be discussedafter the experience of 2 years.

– According to a general inquiry a“young scientists committee” isrequested and will be organizedby Prof. Bilia (ideas and propos-als to ar.bilia@unifi.it).

– A foundation called “GA researchtrust” for funding of awards andof research activities shall be

founded, the necessary startingcapital is 50000 €.

– GA has been granted the Ger-man Brand patents (Markenan-meldung) for its organ “PlantaMedica” and for the GA Logo(poppy capsule);

– GA has introduced the paygatesystem in order to facilitate pay-ing the membership fees via in-ternet per credit card (estab-lished by Dr. Christoffel);

– A new membership administra-tion software with synchronizeddatabase for treasurer and secre-tary by supplier Gruen is in nego-tiation, which can be operated viathe internet;

– The contract with the InternetProvider NetworkSolutions wasprolonged for 5 years; the home-page is operated by Prof. Kopp,Dr. Wawrosch and Ms. Szabo, Vi-enna (many thanks to them!)

– GA became a member of the“Freundeskreis des DeutschenApothekenmuseums in Heidel-berg”, as the pharmacy museumstores the GA archives.

– Egon Stahl Awards. The ESA sil-ver 2007 has been awarded toProf. Alessandra Branca, Dip.Chimica Bioorganica e Biofarma-cia, Pisa; congratulations!

– The Egon Stahl Award in Goldhas been advertised for 2008

– The new “Bionorica PhytoneeringAward of GA” was negotiated byPresident Bauer and Prof. Popp,Bionorica, and was announced toall members. The jury decidednot to award in 2007.

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– 2 issues of the Newsletter havebeen prepared by Prof. Hensel,many thanks!

• GA participated in a series ofWorkshops and Symposia

– GA, represented by Prof. Kopp,acted as a co-organiser of thePhytotherapy congress in Berlinon Sept 28 – 30, 2006, and hadalso contributed to a memoran-dum.

– The LOF Symposium Groningenplanned for 20 Oct. 2006 wascancelled by the organizer Prof.Kayser due to lack of registrations.

– GA, represented by Pres. Bauerwith the opening lecture, actedas a co-organiser at the 1stIberoamerican Symposium onPhytotherapy in Mexico City on30 Nov–2 Dec, 2006.

– GA in person of Pres. Bauer wasinvited guest at the 50th anniver-sary symposium of the Phyto-chemical Society of Europe inCambridge, on 11 – 14April 2007.Prof. Bauer gave a plenary lecture.

– GA has co-organized and sup-ported a Meeting of the PolishHerbal Committee in Poznan-Poland, May 24-25, 2007, organ-ized by Prof. P. Mrozikiewicz,Poznan. Prof. Kopp representedGA.

– GA has also been involved in thesymposium Phytopharm-2007,June 27 – 30, in Leiden, organ-ized by Prof. Verpoorte and Prof.Makarov, Prof. Blaschek acted asrepresentative of GA;

– GA has been invited to a series ofmeetings of the so-called EU-FEPS Presidents’ Club to dis-cuss collaboration within severalsocieties in the field of pharma-ceutical sciences; Profs. Koppand Blaschek attended.

– GA received an invitation to thehearing of interested parties bythe HMPC at EMEA on March 7,2007 in London and to commentdrafts of community herbal mo-nographs and community list en-tries; Prof. Bauer prepared andsent a statement.

– GA has also been invited tomeetings of German stakeholderorganisations in the field of herbalmedicinal products (BPI, BAH,KFN, DPhG, GPhyt) to discussfuture developments in the field(represented by Prof. Blaschek).

– President Prof. Bauer met withthe BoD of the German Pharma-ceutical Society on June 2nd,2007, to discuss common inter-ests and future common activi-ties.

3.2 Reports of the Vice-PresidentsProf. Dr. B. Kopp• She acted as jury chair for ESASilver 2007 and was responsiblefor the procedere of the BionoricaPhytoneering Award 2007.

• Prof. Kopp represented GA at theGPhyt meeting in Berlin (28–30Sept 2006) and at the Poznanmeeting on 24–26 May 07 with awelcome address and attendedthe celebration of the 80th birth-day of Prof. Kemper in Münster

• She supervises the actualisationof the GA homepage in Vienna.

Prof. Dr. W. Blaschek• Since April 1st 2007 Prof. Blaschekacts as interim GA treasurer.

• He was GA delegate in 2 meet-ings initiated by KFN bringing to-gether all interested groups in-volved in phytotherapy and willalso attend the next meetings.

• He attended Phytopharm 2007 inLeiden on 28–30 June 07 andnegotiated on Phytopharm 2008in St. Petersburg in collaborationwith GA.

• He was involved in the organisa-tion of the satellite meeting at theDPhG-GA congress in Erlangenin Oct 07.

3.3 Report of the Secretary(Dr. R. Seitz)She gave the latest statistics: On 1Sept 2007 GA had in total 1212members (in 2006 1192) from 83countries with 11 honorary mem-bers, 134 (compared to 144 in2006) new members since lastyear; 2 members deceased, 43cancelled their membership; 69members, who haven’t paid for 3 ormore years, were excluded; at themoment GA has 34 company mem-bers. 271 members are from coun-tries with reduced fees; of 175members we have no actual e-mailaddress.The request for update of e-mailaddresses along with the NL wasquite successful, but needs to becontinued.Since June 2007 membershipcards will be sent out only whenfees are paid.Despite our efforts not all difficultieswith visa applications for Grazcould be solved successfully.

3.4 Report of the Treasurer andreport of the auditorsProf. Blaschek presented Dr. Chris-toffel’s annual cash report 2006 (in-come 90.862,25 € inclusive con-gress reimbursement, expenses96.465,45 €, cash on hand andbank balances per Dec 31, 2006:76.319,87 €), the budget draft for2007 and the annual statement ofthe Egon Stahl-Awards budget (se-curities and bank balances per Dec31, 2006: 46.944,65 €).Since 1 March 2007 the new pay-ment system for creditcard runssafely and successfully.For all GA accounts on-line-bankingwas established and the daily finan-cial status can be controlled at aglance.

A new software for internet-basedmembers management and ac-countancy will be introduced end of2007.

The cash auditors Profs. Stahl-Biskup and Schilcher thanked thetreasurers Dr. Christoffel (for 2006– 31 March 2007) and Prof. Bla-schek for their transparent andclear accountancy.They agreed to act again as cashauditors for 2008.

3.5 Discharge of the ExCDr. Christoffel seperately in ab-sence and the ExC were unani-mously discharged with 4 absten-tions.Prof. Bauer thanked for dischargingthe ExC and also thanked the teamin the ExC for the enthusiastic work.

4. Planta Medica– Prof. Hamburger resigned as Editorin Chief of Planta Medica by 31 Dec.2006 due to an overload of work;

– GA negotiated with Thieme regardingthe support of the Editorial team andthe workflow resulting in a new edito-rial structure; under these conditionsProf. Luc Pieters agreed to act as thenew editor-in-chief from Jan 1, 2007on;

– the editorial board was extended to16 co-editors with more compe-tences;

– many thanks to Prof. Hamburger forall his efforts in a modernization of thesubmission and reviewing process ofPlanta Medica in the last 2 years andto Prof. Pieters for taking over the jobas Editor in Chief.

– GA is negotiating a general agree-ment with Thieme regarding PlantaMedica and the relation to our Soci-ety.

– As one of the results the abstracts ofthe annual meetings in Helsinki andGraz were published in a regular is-sue of Planta Medica.

– A questionaire in Sept 06 among GAmembers revealed the high interestby many members in a cheaper andeasier online access to Planta Med.

– After long negotiations with ThiemeGA offers now an online subscriptionfor individual GAmembers at reducedrates. Prize: 60 € for access of thelast 10 years, 100 € for access to allvolumes back to 1981;

– From now on invoices for member-ship and the option of an online sub-scription will be sent out in Oct. andhave to be paid by the members tillDec.

• Report of the Editor-in-Chiefof Planta Medica, Prof. L. PietersIn 2006 over 900 papers were submit-ted, 255 were published with pharma-cology/toxicology as the leading topic;China submitted most of the papersfollowed by Germany, Korea, Japan,US, Taiwan and Brazil. IF is now 1.75,

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total citations over 7200. Planta Med-ica has maintained or improved its po-sition compared to all competing jour-nals and is becoming more and morea “pharmacology” journal.

5. Reports of the Permanent Commit-tees (more in www.ga-online.org)5.1 Biological and Pharmacological

Activity of Natural Products (Re-port Prof. Winterhoff)The title of the Graz workshop was“Models for testing addictive behav-iour” with the speakers P. Bäck-stroem, Helsinki-Fi, and R. Doet-koette /H. Winterhoff, Muenster-D.

5.2 Breeding and Cultivation of Me-dicinal Plants (Report Prof. Ch.Franz)He organized the workshop with thetitle “Identification and authentica-tion of plant starting material withthe panelists”. B. Klier, E. Reichand J. Nowak.As ICMAP president (InternationalCouncil of MAPs) he pointed at thenext World conference on MAPs(WOCMAP 4) in Capetown, SA, onNov. 9-14, 2008 (organized byICMAP).

5.3 Manufacturing and Quality Con-trol of HMPs (Report Prof. Meier)The question “Pharmakokinetics ofHMPs – useful or not?” of his Grazworkshop was discussed by thepanelists R. Länger, F. Lang and K.Wölkert.

5.4 Regulatory Affairs on HMPs(Report Prof. Vlietinck)For the 1st time Prof. Vlietinck or-ganized a half day workshop to-gether with Prof. Alban, Kiel, withthe title “Importance of HMPC com-munity monographs and commu-nity list entries for the marketing au-thorisation and registration ofHMPs in Europe”. The panelists H.Pittner, HMPC chair at EMEA, B.Steinhoff, Co-chair of ESCOP andAESGP, B. Roether, Bionorica, andP. Coppens of EBF contributed toall aspects of the topic.

6. Discussions and decisionsThe proposal of the BoD for the changeof the name of the Society into “Societyfor Medicinal Plant and Natural ProductResearch – Gesellschaft für Arzneipflan-zen- und Naturstoff-Forschung (GA)”was intensely discussed; a majority ofthe participants was in favour to changethe name as proposed, but another pro-posal came into discussion: “Society forNatural Product and Medicinal Plant Re-search”. Due to time pressure it was notclear whether the first version “Societyfor Medicinal Plant and Natural ProductResearch – Gesellschaft für Arzneipflan-zen- und Naturstoff-Forschung (GA)”reached the necessary two-third major-ity; therefore this decision was post-poned to the next meeting; an e-mailvoting of all members was suggested to

get a broader view on the acceptance ofthe new name.

GA Research Trust: Still more moneyis needed to found the trust, no ruleshave been prepared so far.

The assembly agreed to the new ESAmonetary values: ESA bronze 1500 €,ESA silver 3000 €.

The proposed change of § 8 of the by-laws for future online membership appli-cation without signature was acceptedunanimously. The change reads as fol-lows:§ 8 – Initiation and Termination ofMembership(1) The initiation of membership eitheras a regular or supporting memberneeds a written request to the ExecutiveCouncil by letter, fax or internet usingthe appropriate application forms.The acceptance of a new member is ef-fected by appropriate action of the Pres-ident and the Secretary acting for theExecutive Council. The Secretary in-forms the applicant in writing by letter,fax or internet concerning acceptance ornon-acceptance.

7. Election of the Board of DirectorsExC candidates were for president Prof.Dr. Brigitte Kopp, for vice presidentsProf. Dr. Rudolf Bauer and Prof. Dr.Wolfgang Blaschek, for secretary Dr.Renate Seitz, for treasurer Dr. BerndRoether.

Additional to the 15 candidates pro-posed by the BoD for the AdvisoryBoard (Prof. Dr. Susanne Alban, Ger-many, Dr. Anna Rita Bilia, Italy, Prof. Dr.Veronika Butterweck, USA, Dr. ClemensErdelmeier, Germany, Prof. Dr. DeanGuo, China, Prof. Dr. Matthias Ham-burger, Switzerland, Prof. Dr. MichaelHeinrich, U.K., Prof. Dr. Andreas Hen-sel, Germany, Prof. Dr. Wolfgang Kreis,Germany, Prof. Dr. Marie-Aleth Lac-caille-Dubois, France, Prof. MatthiasMelzig, Germany, Prof. Dr. Deniz Tas-demir, U.K., Prof. Dr. Arnold Vlietinck,Belgium, Prof. Dr. Heikki Vuorela, Fin-land, Prof. Dr. Yang Ye, China) the audi-ence proposed 2 additional candidates:Dr. (Mrs.) O. Adeyemi, Nigeria, andProf. Dr. KHC Baser,Turkey.

Profs. Stahl-Biskup and Schilcher as re-turning officers chaired the electionsand presented the results out of 162votes:

PresidentProf. Dr. Brigitte Kopp (votes: 145 yes, 8no, 8 abstentions)Vice-PresidentsProf. Dr. Rudolf Bauer (votes: 148 yes, 0no, 2 abstentions)Prof. Dr. Wolfgang Blaschek (votes: 150yes, 0 no, 2 abstentions)TreasurerDr. Bernd Roether (votes: 154 yes, 0 no,8 abstentions)SecretaryDr. Renate Seitz (votes: 156 yes, 0 no,6 abstentions)

The Advisory BoardThe following 8 candidates were elected:

Prof. Dr. Susanne Alban, Kiel-Germany(votes: 81)Prof. Dr. Anna Rita Bilia, Florence-Italy(97)Prof. Dr. Veronika Butterweck, Gains-ville, Fl-USA (97)Prof. Dr. Matthias Hamburger, Basel-Switzerland (98)Prof. Dr. Andreas Hensel, Muenster-Germany (93)Prof. Dr. Michael Heinrich, London, UK(77)Prof. Dr. Arnold Vlietinck, Antwerp – Bel-gium (94)Prof. Dr. Heikki Vuorela, Helsinki-Fin-land (84)

All candidates accepted.Two additional members of the advisoryboard will be coopted by the new ExC.

8. Future congresses, symposia andworkshops (see also www.ga-online.org)• 2008, 3–8 Aug., Joint meeting inAthens organized by AFERP (orga-nizer Prof. L. Skaltsounis, Athens) to-gether with GA, ASP, PSE and SIF(Soc. Ital. Fitochimca)

• 2009, 16–20 Aug., Annual Congressin Geneva (organizer Prof. Dr. K.Hostettmann)

• 2010, 29 Aug. – 2 Sept., Annual Meet-ing in Berlin (organizers Profs. Melzigand Kolodziej)

• 2011: Annual Meeting in Antalya,Turkey (organizer Prof. H. Baser)

Other symposia and workshops of GA• 2007, 10–13 Oct, Erlangen: DPhGCongress (in collaboration with GAand ÖPhG and a post symposium or-ganized by Prof. S. Alban on “Interac-tions”)

• 2007, 5–8 Nov, Nonnweiler: 4th Mistle-toe Symposium (Prof. Kreis as GArepresentative)

• 2008, 14–16 Feb., Gphyt/GA-Meetingin Berlin (organized by Prof. Schulz)

• 2008, 18–21 Feb., Bernburg/Germany5. Fachtagung Arznei- und Gewürz-pflanzen (organized by Prof. Pankand C. Franz for GA)

• 2008, April 24–25, Workshop on Me-tabolomics und Systems Biology inLeiden (farewell symposium of Prof.Scheffer, organized by Prof. Verpoorteand Prof. Scheffer)

• 2008, 12–16 April, 7th Oxford Interna-tional Conference on Science of Bota-nicals (ICSB) at the University of Mis-sissippi, USA (organized by Prof. I.Khan in collaboration with GA)

• 2008, 2–4 July St. Petersburg: Phy-topharm 2008 (organizer Prof. Maka-rov and GA)

9. MiscellaneousProf. Bauer thanked all members andthe BoD for continous support during hispresidency and closed the meeting.

Oct. 20th 2007, Prof. Dr. Rudolf Bauer,GA President; Dr. R. Seitz, GA secretary

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GRAZ2007

55th International Congressand Annual Meeting of the Society forMedicinal Plant Research

Graz, AustriaSeptember 2–6, 2007

http://www.ga2007.org

Annual GA congress 2007 in Graz, Austria

Our annual GA congress 2007 was held inGraz, the capital of the province of Styriaand Austria’s second largest and famouslycharming city, cultural capital of Europe in2002 and UNESCO world heritage since1999. From September 2 – 6 over 870 par-ticipants from 75 countries worldwide hadfollowed the invitation of GA and congresspresident Prof. Rudolf Bauer, head of theInstitute for Pharmaceutical Sciences inGraz. The conference started on Sundayevening with a Get-together-Party in thehistorical main hall of the Karl-Franzens-University of Graz (founded in 1585), theother days the scientists met at the GrazConvention Centre, also a historical site inthe centre of the city.772 abstracts had been accepted to makea pretentious programme with the maintopics “anti-inflammatory and immunomod-ulatory active natural products, naturalproducts with antimicrobial activity, analy-sis and biopharmaceutics of herbal medici-nal products, traditional herbal medicinalproducts, and medicinal plants in animalhealthcare”. Again the abstracts wereprinted in a regular issue of Planta Medica(# 9, vol. 73). The contributions resulted in9 invited plenary lectures, 9 keynote lec-tures, 73 short lectures and 664 posters.Additionally, 7 workshops on various topicsplus the already traditional Young Re-searcher Pre-Symposium were held (thedetailed programme under www.ga-online.org/previousevents)The congress was opened with welcomeaddresses of the Austrian Federal Ministerfor Science and Research, Dr. J. Hahn, thegovernor of Styria, F. Voves, the mayor ofGraz, BM S. Nagl, the rector of the Karl-Franzens University, Prof. Dr. A. Gutschel-hofer and by the congress president Prof.R. Bauer. He thanked for the great world-wide interest in his congress and consid-

ered it as a great honour that the openinglecture with the title “Bioactive NaturalProducts: A journey of a Thai Scientist” washeld by. She presented some promisingThai plants under investigation in her insti-tute with a main focus on cancer research.Princess Chulabhorn was later honouredwith the golden ring of the Graz University.In the following award ceremony, GA vicepresident Prof. Brigitte Kopp introduced thewinner of the Egon Stahl award in silver of2007, Prof. Dr. Alessandra Braca from theUniversity of Pisa, who then presented heroutstanding research in the award lecture.Prof. T. Schmidt, Münster, chair of thetravel grant committee 2007, announcedthe 34 happy winners from all over theworld of the student’s travel grant (in sum

10000€) and 12 winners of the newly in-stalled travel grant for post docs from de-veloping countries (also 10000 €). Unfortu-nately and despite great efforts on GA side,some of these TG awardees could not at-tend the conference due to visa restrictions.

Three plenary lectures topped the daily sci-entific programme continuing in 2 parallelsessions of keynote and short lectures:P.A. Cox, Institute for Ethnomedicine, Jack-son Hole, Wyoming, USA, started with“Biodiversity and the search for new medi-cines”. S. Gibbons from the School of Phar-macy in London, U.K., spoke about “Phyto-chemicals for bacterial resistance –strengths, weaknesses and opportunities”,followed by Louis Maes, Laboratory of Mi-

Prof. Dr. HRH Princess Chulabhorn Mahidol, president of the Chulabhorn ResearchInstitute in Bangkok, Thailand obtains a guest present in form of a picture of historic downtown Graz from president Prof. Bauer, the organizer of 2008 GA-Symposium

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crobiology, Parasitology and Hygiene(LMPH), University of Antwerp, Belgium,with “Natural products with antimicrobialactivity: from figures to facts”. The otherplenary speakers were Chlodwig Franz, In-stitute for Applied Botany and Pharmacog-nosy of the University of Veterinary Medi-cine Vienna, Austria, with “Functional PlantProducts in Veterinary Medicine and Ani-mal Nutrition”, Oliver Ullrich of the Instituteof Anatomy, Faculty of Medicine, Universityof Zurich, Switzerland, with “Immune sur-veillance of the central nervous system inhealth and disease – therapeutic interven-tion by natural products”, Verena Dirsch,Department of Pharmacognosy, Universityof Vienna, Austria, with “Natural productsand chronic inflammatory vascular pro-cesses”, also Yang Ye, State Key Labora-tory of Drug Research, Shanghai Instituteof Materia Medica, Chinese Academy ofSciences, Shanghai, China with “Struc-tures and bioactivity of alkaloids from Ste-mona”, and Nikolaus J. Sucher, HerbalAnalysis and Pharmacology Laboratories,Centre for Complementary Medicine Re-search, University of Western Sydney, Aus-tralia, with “Chips and Qi: microchip-basedauthentication of traditional Chinese medic-inal plants”.

All posters could be displayed throughoutthe whole congress and were individuallypresented in 3 poster sessions.• The workshops organized either by thechairs of the Permanent Committees ofGA or special research groups dealt with

• Pharmacokinetics of herbal medicinalproducts – useful or not?

• Models for testing addictive behaviour• Identification and authentication of plantstarting materials

• Nasal innate and adaptive immune re-sponse and their influence by herbalpreparations

• State of the art in clinical and preclinicalstudies with EPs® 7630 (Umckaloabo®)

• Echinacea: Update on current research• The workshop on regulatory affairs dis-cussing the “Importance of HMPC com-munity monographs and community listfor the marketing authorisation and regis-tration of herbal medicinal products inEurope” was organized as a half day pre-symposium.

The congress was supported and spon-sored by the Austrian Federal Ministry forScience and Research, the government ofStyria, the city of Graz, the Karl-Franzens-University of Graz and by 31 pharmaceuti-cal companies, most of them also con-tributing to an interesting phytopharmaceu-tical exhibition.As usual the annual members meeting ofthe Society for Medicinal Plant Researchwas held during the congress on Tuesdaylate afternoon with elections of the new Ex-ecutive and Advisory Board of the Society.Unusually many members – 162 – at-tended the meeting (see also report of themembers’ meeting). A special GA booth forpersonal inquiries and the possibility to payopen membership fees in cash was verywell accepted by the members. 43 con-gress participants applied there for GAmembership (see welcome address to ournew members in this NL). Thanks to thetreasurer’s assistant, Ms. A. Lahse!A great variety of social events gave ampleopportunities for private mingling: After theGet-together-party on Sunday, the gover-nor of Styria and the mayor of Graz invitedto a reception in the Grand Hall of the “Old

University” on Monday evening. A an organconcert was arranged for Tuesday night inthe majestic Graz Cathedral. Highlight onWednesday was the Congress dinner in anancient “soap factory”, organized as a Styr-ian evening with local food, folklore, musicand dancing. For the first time the dinnerwas included in the general registrationfee, earlier leaving participants were askedto return their tickets for students on a wait-ing list. As a nice result younger and olderparticipants were nicely mixed with the finalunanimous opinion: a wonderful evening!On the last day of the congress 3 excur-sions were offered: One to the wine-grow-ing area of Western Styria (“Plants, cultureand wine”), the other (“Spirit and spirits”) totypical monastries in Eastern Styria with avisit to a pumpkin oil mill and spirits tasting.Due to bad weather and snowfall down to1000 m the traditional botanical excursionto the Styrian alps (“Alpine plants in theirhabitat”) had to be cancelled, instead of thegroup visited the famous convent and li-brary of Admont in Northern Styria.For accompanying persons (and thoseneeding a break in science) interestingwalking tours through the city of Graz, thehistorical centre of Graz and some famoushistoric pharmacies were offered. A visit tothe breeding farm of the world famous Lip-pizaner horses was organized as a pre-symposium tour on cloudless Sunday.Surely most participants of the Graz con-gress agree, that congress president Bauerhad not promised too much by wishing allof us a succesful meeting with a perfectmeeting atmosphere in the charming city ofGraz. Thanks to him and his indefatigableand charming crew!

Renate Seitz

3rd Young Researcher Workshop (YRW) in GrazDuring the Graz conference the 3rd YRW ofGA took place and was attended by 85highly motivated young people from allover the world. From 55 abstracts whichhad been submitted, 12 had been selectedfor oral presentation. The speakers camefrom 8 different countries, covering a quitewide range of actual research: beside bio-synthetic questions, analytical innovations,structure elucidation and molecular targetbiochemical research were topics of thetalks. Nearly all presentations had a veryhigh scientific standard, excellent rhetoricquality and were presented with much en-thusiasm. The discussions together with theauditorium were open and very constructive.2 of the best presentations were chosen fora special price; additionally the best contri-butions coming from the audience were alsoselected for a monetary price. All awardshave been sponsored by Bionorika AG.A survey was made by the organisers (A.R.Bilia, A. Deters, A. Hensel, M. Keusgen) byall attendees, with the result that over 90%found the YRW useful for the daily labwork. The YRW will therefore be continuedwithin the next years. Hensel The winner of the YRW awards 2007

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Dear colleagues and friends,

We have the privilege and pleasure to in-form you that the 7th Joint Meeting of thescientific societies AFERP, ASP, GA,PSE & SIF will be held in Athens, Greeceat the Athenaeum Intercontinental Hotel onAugust 3-8th, 2008.

Our primary intention is to gather expertsand scientists in natural products with phar-

maceutical, nutraceutical, cosmetic andagrochemical interest from all over theworld and invite them to present their re-searches and to describe current scientifictrends. There will be many opportunitiesduring the Congress, for extensive discus-sions and exchange of knowledge andviews.

The Scientific and the Organizing Commit-tees, as well as the five Scientific Societiescordially invite you to participate, thus deci-sively contributing to the Congress suc-cess.With the warmest salutations

Prof. Leandros Skaltsounis,President of the Congress

Next Annual GA Meeting

56th International Congress andAnnual Meeting of the Society forMedicinal Plant Research

Athens, GreeceAugust 3–8th, 2008

Other MeetingsBerlin, Germany14 – 16th February 2008Phytopharmaka und Phytotherapie 2008 –Forschung und Praxishttp://www.ga-online.org/files/Berlin/flyer08_07.pdf

Bernburg-Strenzfeld, Germany18 – 21st. February 200818. Bernburger Winterseminar und

5. Fachtagung Arznei- und Gewürz-pflanzen; Qualität, Wirtschaftlichkeit undNachhaltigkeithttp://www.llg-lsa.de;Sybille.Richter@llg.mlu.lsa-net.de

University, MS, USAApril 12 – 16, 20087th Annual Oxford International Confer-ence on the Science of Botanicals &

American Society of Pharmacognosy4th Interim Meetinghttp://www.OxfordICSB.org

Leiden, The NetherlandsApril 24–25th 2008GA Symposium: Plants systems biologyand medicinal plantsSystems biology is revolutionizing science.It means a different approach to study bio-

Main Scientific Topics

1. Drug discovery from natural sources2. New sources of bioactive natural prod-

ucts: from biodiversity to chemodiversity3. Cell cycle regulation and natural prod-

ucts4. Biosynthesis and biomimetic synthesis

of natural products5. Natural products with cosmetic, agro-

chemical and veterinary interest6. Bioavailability and quality of herbal

drugs7. Health improvement through dietary

phytochemicals8. Modern approaches to traditional medi-

cines9. New trends in extraction, separation

and structural determination processes

Workshops

• Young Researcher workshop on 3rd Au-gust 2008.

• Regulatory Affairs on Herbal MedicinalProducts on 3rd August 2008.More workshops will be announced onsecond announcement.

Abstract submission deadline: 5th April. Ab-stracts will be published in Planta Medica.The second announcement will be sendout in January 2008.

Official webside:www.jointmeeting.2008athens.gr

CORRESPONDENCE

Scientific aspects: Prof. L. Skaltsounis,Chairman of scientific committee, Univer-sity of Athens, Faculty of Pharamacy, De-partment of Pharmacognosy and Chem-istry of Natural Compounds, Athens, 15771,Greece, Tel:+302107274598 / Fax: +302107274594 E-mail: skaltsounis@pharm.uoa.gr

For registration & hotel reservationplease contact the congress secretariat:AFEA Travel Consultants & CongressServices, 39-41 Lykavittou Str., 10672Athens, Greece, Tel. +302103668852 / Fax+302103643511 Email: afea.jointmeeting@2008athens.gr

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logical systems, i.e. studying the systemsin a more holistic way. In complex organ-isms such as plants this offers many newopportunities and many challenges. Forstudying plant resistance against pests anddiseases, or studying the effect of medici-nal plants in living systems (cells, animalsor humans), systems biology will be ofgreat value. Key technologies in systemsbiology are transcriptomics, proteomicsand metabolomics. Particularly the lattertechnology is of great interest for findingcompounds that correlate with biologicalactivity, e.g. in resistance against insects,or a pharmacological activity. Metabolo-mics is also an important tool for qualitycontrol of plant products, e.g. showingequivalence of GMOs, or for control of con-sistency of the composition of botanicals.The 2-days symposium will highlight anumber of aspects of plant systems biologyin relation to the above mentioned applica-tions. Topics of the invited talks: Systemsbiology; TCM and systems biology; Unrav-eling biosynthesis in medicinal plants;Transcriptomics for unraveling pathways;Plant NMR-based metabolomics; Essentialoils analysis, metabolomics avant-la-let-tre?; Proteomics; Metabolic Fluxes.

Course in MetabolomicsIn connection with the meeting we will or-ganize a Course in Metabolomics, startingApril 21 and finishing April 29, not including

the meeting. Further information can be ob-tained from R. Verpoorte (address see be-low).

R. Verpoorte, Department of Pharmacog-nosy, Section Metabolomics, IBL, P.O. Box9502, 2300 RA, Leiden, The Netherlands;FCOGSYMP@LACDR.LeidenUniv.NL

London, U.K.May 1st 2008APSGB meeting: Royal PharmaceuticalSociety Headquarters, London, U.K.

Diet and health: cause for concern or over-hyped? Nutrition and immunity; Pharmaco-logical effects of dietary unsaturated fattyacids; Is lycopene a biologically importantcarotenoid for humans? Sulfur-containingcompounds from the cabbage family; Iso-flavones and other phytoestrogens – linkswith cancer prevention and gynaecologicalconditions? Anthocyanidins, mental healthand cardiovascular disease; Phenolicsfrom tea, coffee and other drinks; Are an-tioxidants of any real use in disease pre-vention?http://www.rpsgb.org.uk/worldofpharmacy/events/

Andhra Pradesh, IndiaMarch 7-9th 2008International seminar on medicinal plantsand herbal products.

The seminar is expected to be attended byseveral experts from well-known researchand academic institutions, eminent medicalphysicians, traditional practitioners, NGOs,manufacturer of herbal products, membersfrom the corporate sector, marketing con-sultants and farmers from all over India.The delegates will get ample opportunityfor exchange of ideas through individualand group discussions. The aim of theseminar is to provide a platform for mutualunderstanding and discussion between sci-entists about various aspects of researchrelated to Medicinal plants and for formulat-ing strategies to achieve the commongoals.The seminar will cover cultivation, extrac-tion of Medicinal plants and Herbal Prod-ucts, Plant biotechnology, Supply of plant-ing material and herbal products, applica-tions in Ayurveda, Herbal Cosmetics andPharmaceuticals, standardization andquality control issues and marketing as-pects.Organized by Department of Botany, S.V.University, Tirupati & AP Medicinal Aroma-tic Plant Board, Hyderabad; http://ismphp.blogspot.com/

St. Petersburg, RussiaJuly 2 – 4, 200812th International Congress“Phytopharm 2008”http://www.adaptogen.ru/phyto2008.html

Meeting Reports

4th Mistletoe Symposium, EuropäischesBildungszentrum, Nonnweiler-Otzenhau-sen (Germany), 8th to 10th November2007: Mistletoe in Tumour Therapy – Ba-sic Research and Clinical Practice

Treatment with mistletoe preparations isone of the most important methods of com-plementary oncology. More than 110 scien-tists and physicians from different therapyapproaches and scientific disciplines, man-ufacturers of mistletoe preparations andrepresentatives of authorities came to-gether in the to present and discuss thecurrent status of mistletoe in tumour ther-apy in 51 contributions. The symposiumwas organised and sponsored by the Karlund Veronica Carstens Stiftung and theGesellschaft Anthroposophischer Ärzte inDeutschland (German Society of Anthropo-sophical Doctors) together with the GA, So-ciety for Phytotherapy), German Pharma-ceutical Society and Central Association ofDoctors in Naturopathic and RegulationMedicine. The International Association forPharmaceutical Technology was a co-oper-ation partner. As in the previous three sym-posia, the organisational director was Dr.Rainer Scheer from Carl Gustav Carus-In-stitut in Niefern-Öschelbronn. The range ofviewpoints of the organising associationsand speakers lent this symposium its par-ticular character. It took place in a construc-tive atmosphere, which is typical of this se-

ries of symposia held every four years. Theaim of these meetings is to create a forumfor discussion, enabling participants to re-view current studies and the latest findings.It is hoped that medical doctors (whether ingeneral or hospital practice), pharmacistsand health insurance funds will obtain asobjective a picture as possible of the useand current state of scientific knowledgeabout mistletoe extracts in basic researchand therapy, but also identify their potentialand their limitations. The symposia are alsointended to bring about factually based dia-logue and stimulate further research.The contributions dealt with current and im-portant topics from the fields of biology,pharmacy and pharmacology. In detail,these involved the effects of different ingre-dients, immunological and clinical resultsas well as reports from clinical practicethrough to clinical trials aimed at identifyingspecific effects or demonstrating the effi-cacy of mistletoe preparations. As in theprevious symposia, advances in the scien-tific as well as the medical sphere could beidentified. The participation of a number ofyoung researchers should again be high-lighted. Naturally the eight summary pa-pers, 33 short papers and 10 posters fo-cused on clinical subjects. Prof. Dr. StefanF. Martin (Department of Dermatology,Freiburg University Medical Center) talkedabout the dual role of inflammation in can-cer: on the one hand the rather tumour-pro-

moting effect of chronic inflammation and,on the other hand, the acute inflammationthat can be exploited for therapeutic pur-poses, in relation to which the role ofmistletoe preparations was discussed. Theimportance of mistletoe in oncology todaywas highlighted by two clinicians from theperspectives of anthroposophical medicine(Dr. Boris Müller-Hübenthal, Filderklinik,Filderstadt) and herbal medicine (Dr. PeterHolzhauer, Veramed-Klinik am Wendel-stein, Brannenburg). Other topics werestudies on the efficacy and safe use ofmistletoe preparations, alone or as an ad-junct to standard oncology treatments(surgery, chemotherapy) with the aim ofproducing a beneficial effect on the im-munosuppression caused by the standardtherapies. Various instruments of clinicalresearch were used, such as controlled(randomised and non-randomised) studiesand cohort studies, but also observationalstudies which reflect everyday clinical prac-tice more closely, as well as case historiesand reports of clinical experience, mainlyconcerning breast cancer patients butother tumour entities as well. The patients’quality of life, which was reduced by sideeffects associated with standard therapyand the disease, was improved in manycases. Another presentation dealt withmistletoe therapy in paediatric oncology. Inaddition to the whole range of clinical trials,there were questions about dosage, phar-

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macokinetic studies, through to the devel-opment and validation of new mistletoe-specific instruments for clinical testing,such as Cancer Fatigue or Internal Coher-ence questionnaires, and the developmentof a database embracing both hospital andgeneral practice, which is an instrument ofhealth services research. Several speakersdealt with methodological questions. Dr.Matthias Rostock (Klinik für Tumorbiologie,Freiburg) presented results of the Coch-rane Review, the latest meta-analysis inwhich 21 randomised clinical trials werecomparatively reviewed. Dr. Gunver S.Kienle (Institute for Applied Epistemologyand Medical Methodology, Bad Krotzingen)gave an overview of other systematic studyreviews and their analysis, stressing thatthe critical evaluation of a therapy mainlydepends on the quality of the method,meaningfulness in medical and medicinalterms and relevance to practice. It becameclear from the discussion that comparisonsshould also take account of the diversity ofthe mistletoe preparations tested. It is diffi-cult to conduct randomised clinical trialswith mistletoe preparations because peo-ple often cannot be randomised, i.e. theyare understandably reluctant to leave theirtherapy to chance, and because patients inthe non-mistletoe group frequently still takemistletoe, which means the real differencefrom the mistletoe group is diminished. Inaddition, the dosage regimen in mistletoetherapy is usually determined on an individ-ual basis, which is why this essential ap-proach in clinical practice cannot always betested in a rigid trial regimen. In his sum-mary paper, Dr. Harald Matthes (Gemein-schaftskrankenhaus Havelhöhe, Berlin)therefore contrasted health service re-search with randomised clinical trials andcommented on the use of this instrument incomplementary oncology.

It was particularly pleasing that the GermanFederal Institute for Drugs and Medical De-vices was represented by Dr. ChristianeKirchner on the “Regulatory options for Vis-cum album preparations”. Other scientificreports covered particular characteristics ofdifferent mistletoe ingredients, their interac-tions with each other and galenical sub-jects such as liposomes and the furtherpharmaceutical development of mistletoepreparations. Biology was represented bychronobiological and specific questionsabout the host trees of mistletoe. In the pre-clinical sphere Prof. Dr. Reinhild Klein (De-partment of Internal Medicine II, Tübingen

University Hospital) gave an overview of“Effects of mistletoe extracts on immuno-competent cells in vitro and in vivo”, whilesubjects covered in short papers and pos-ters included apoptosis, cytotoxicity andagain the exclusion of tumour stimulationby mistletoe extracts.

All abstracts were published in Phytomedi-cine and are freely available on the internet(www.ScienceDirect.com)

Dr. Rainer Scheer,Carl Gustav Carus-Institut,Niefern-Öschelbronn

Representatives of the scientific associations and organisers of the Mistletoe Symposium(left to right): Dr. Harald Matthes, Berlin, Prof. Dr. Wolfgang Kreis, Erlangen,Dr. Rainer Scheer, Niefern-Öschelbronn, Prof. Dr. Dr. h.c. mult. Fritz H. Kemper, Münster,Prof. Dr. Hans Becker, St. Ingbert, Prof. Dr. Wolfgang Blaschek, Kiel

How to write and to submit a manuscriptfor Planta Medica

By L. Pieters,Editor-in-Chief of Planta Medica

In conjunction with the Workshop for YoungResearchers during the 55th InternationalCongress & Annual Meeting of the Societyfor Medicinal Plant Research in Graz (Sep-tember 2 – 6, 2007), a seminar was organ-ised on “How to write and to submit a man-uscript for Planta Medica”. Quite often it isobserved that authors have not taken intoaccount some basic requirements for apublication in Planta Medica, which leadsto rejection of the manuscript or a delay inthe review process. Therefore it was de-cided to highlight the most important pointsof the Guidelines in the GA Newsletter.

According to its subtitle Planta Medica is“An International Journal of Natural Prod-

ucts and Medicinal Plant Research”. Thejournal is not restricted to medicinal plants,but covers all research on bioactive naturalproducts. Manuscripts can be submittedexclusively online at http://mc.manuscript-central.com/plamed or using the link athttp://www.thieme.de/plantamedica.

Manuscripts cannot be accepted for publi-cation in Planta Medica unless the follow-ing conditions, if applicable, are fulfilled:

1. Submission of a manuscript to PlantaMedica implies that it represents origi-nal research not previously publishedand that it is not being considered forpublication elsewhere. Authors inves-

tigating the chemistry of a singlespecies should aim to publish their re-sults in a single manuscript rather thanin a series of papers. Manuscriptsshould not report fragmentary partsof a larger study.

2. Language of publication is English.Manuscripts written by authors whosemother language is not English should

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be checked by a native speaker or aprofessional language editing servicebefore submission.

3. Plant material (as well as other organ-isms) must be properly identified. Thescientific name (in italic), the author ofthis name and the family must begiven. It should be mentioned whoidentified the material. The manuscriptmust include references to voucherspecimens of the plants (deposited ina major regional herbarium) or the ma-terial examined.

4. Isolation of compounds: Extractionand isolation should be described indetail.The kind and amount of material,solvents and extraction methods mustbe indicated. The description of chro-matographic systems should containthe quantitative information that allowsthe reader to repeat the work. Columndimensions, elution volumes, fractionsizes, etc. should be reported.

5. Papers dealing with the biologicalscreening of series of uncharac-terised extracts of plants or other or-ganisms will not be considered for pub-lication in Planta Medica.

6. Pharmacological investigations ofextracts require detailed extract cha-racterisation. Chromatographic profil-ing (e.g. HPLC profile with at least themajor peaks identified) should be car-ried out, or qualitative and quantitativeinformation on active or typical con-stituents should be provided.

7. Pharmacological investigations:Planta Medica will only consider manu-scripts in which conclusions are basedon adequate statistics. In each casepositive controls (reference com-pounds) should be used and the dose /activity dependence should be shown.

8. Pharmacological investigations:When working with experimental ani-mals, reference must be made to prin-ciples of laboratory animal care or sim-ilar regulations, and to approval by thelocal ethical committee.

9. Clinical studies must be designed, im-plemented and analyzed in a manner tomeet current standards of randomizedcontrolled trials.

10. Analytical studies: Key data on me-thod validation must be provided and

should typically include information onspecificity, linearity, limit of detection,limit of quantification, accuracy, preci-sion, intermediate precision, and somerobustness studies. Information on thepurity of reference compounds, and onthe methods used for the determinationof purity must be given. Recoveries ofextraction and sample pre-purificationsteps have to be indicated. Adequatestatistical treatment of data is required.

L. Pieters

The GA executive council, the advisory board and some guests: many discussions during the last meeting in August 2007 during our Grazconference

Two Impressions from GA’s daily administration work

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University of Innsbruck (Austria)Institute of Pharmacy / Pharmacognosy

Address: Innrain 52c, A-6020 Innsbruck, Austria

Homepage: www.uibk.ac.at/pharmazie/pharmakognosie/

Univ.-Professor Dr. Hermann StuppnerHead of the Institute of Pharmacy, PharmacistHermann.Stuppner@uibk.ac.at

Expertise: Scientific background as phytochemist and/or pharmaceutical biologist of more than 25 years.Outstanding expertise in the discovery of bioactive NPs applying classical pharmacognostic approaches as wellas computational methods

PD Dr. Markus GanzeraPharmacist, Markus.Ganzera@uibk.ac.at

Expertise: Analysis of natural products by modern analytical techniques (e.g. HPLC, GC, CE, CEC, LC-MS,CE-MS), method development and validation for scientific and commercial applications, isolation and elucidationof secondary metabolites from plants, establishing enzyme assays for activity screening (elastase, CYP)

A. Univ.-Professor Dr. Judith Maria RollingerPharmacist, Judith.Rollinger@uibk.ac.at

Expertise: Research on bioactive metabolites from plants with special emphasis on drug candidates actingagainst inflammation, pain and dementia. Applied methods: computer-assisted strategies (pharmacophore-basedvirtual screening, docking, neural networks) and classical pharmacognostic methods (bioguided fractionation,ethnopharmacology)

Ass. -Professor Dr. Sonja SturmPharmacist, Sonja.Sturm@uibk.ac.at

Expertise: Research on bioactive natural products with analytical main focus; hyphenation of high performancemethods (capillary electrophoresis, high performance liquid chromatography, gas-chromatography) with massspectrometry and NMR spectroscopy; isolation and characterization of pharmacologically active plant constituents

Dr. Stefan SchwaigerPharmacist, Stefan.Schwaiger@uibk.ac.at

Expertise: Isolation and structure elucidation of secondary metabolites with special interest in plants with un-known toxic principals and/or use in the traditional medicine in combination with pharmacological profiling of plantextracts and pure secondary metabolites

GA worldwideand their Institutes of Pharmacognosy: International, Interestingand Cooperative

We introduce and present different institutes of Pharmacognosy/Pharmaceutical Biology,dealing with medicinal plant research with their special characteristics. In this Newsletter:Austria.Austria, as one of the leading countries in medicinal plant research, helds three differentacademic places for Pharmaceutical Biology or as it is called in Austria Pharmacognosy:Vienna, Graz and Innsbruck. Have a look on the structures and activities of these fascinat-ing and highly active groups. Additionally a national platform (HMPPA) for intensified net-working was founded, combining the different expertise of all austrian academic institutions.

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A.Univ.-Professor Dr. Christian ZidornPharmacist, Natural Products Chemist, Botanist Christian.H.Zidorn@uibk.ac.at

Expertise: Chemosystematics with a focus on Apiaceae and Asteraceae, chemical ecology focused on altitudinalvariation in plant secondary metabolites, natural products analysis employing HPLC-DAD and HPLC-MS, struc-ture elucidation (HRMS, NMR), geobotany focussing on alpine taxa.

Coworkers: PhD students: 7; Lecturers: Dr. Peter-Klaus Connert, Prof. Dr. Michael Popp, Dr. Elisabeth Nogler-Semenitz,Postdocs: Dr. Diana Antal, Dr. Bernhard Dickoré

Working areas: Chemosystematics & Chemical ecology: Chemosystematics research focuses on two major areas: chemicalsystematics of the tribe Lactuceae (Asteraceae family) and bioactives from the Apiaceae family with a major focuson species used as food plants.Drug discovery from nature: This area focuses on phytochemical and pharmacological investigations of naturalmaterials applying various strategies using as rationale for the discovery of bioactive constituents: (i) ethno-pharmacological approach, (ii) computer-assisted approach (pharmacophore-based virtual screening, docking,neural networks), and (iii) random screening of untapped plants followed by bioassay-guided fractionation.Analytics: Analysis and quality assessment of (medicinal) plants and Phyto-pharmaceuticals using hyphenatedtechniques, such as GC/MS, HPLC/MS, CE/MS and HPLC/SPE/NMR Analytics.

5 publications, Ganzera, M., Aberham, A., Stuppner, H. (2006): Development and validation of an HPLC/UV/MS method for therepresenting the simultaneous determination of 18 preservatives in grapefruit seed extract, J. Agric. Food Chem. 54, 3768–3772working group: Rollinger, J. M., Schuster, D., Baier, E., Ellmerer, E. P., Langer, T., Stuppner, H. (2006): Taspine: Bioactivity-

guided isolation and molecular ligand-target insight of a potent acetylcholinesterase inhibitor from Magnolia xsoulangiana. J. Nat. Prod. 69, 1341–1346Schmieder, A., Schwaiger, S., Csordas, A., Backovic, A., Messner, B., Wick, G., Stuppner, H., Bernhard, D. (2007):Isogentisin – A novel compound for the prevention of smoking-caused endothelial injury. Atherosclerosis 194(2),317–325.S. Sturm, C. Seger, and H. Stuppner (2007) Analysis Of Central European Corydalis Species By NonaqueousCapillary Electrophoresis – Electrospray Ion Trap Mass Spectrometry. J. Chromatogr. A 1159, 41–50Spitaler, R., Schlorhaufer, P. D., Ellmerer, E. P., Merfort, I., Bortenschlager, S., Stuppner, H., Zidorn, C. (2006):Altitudinal variation of secondary metabolite profiles in flowering heads of Arnica montana cv. ARBO. Phyto-chemistry 67, 409–417.

The “speciality” Research of the Pharmacognosy group is dedicated to the significance of natural products in respect to theiror the unique chemosystematic and analytical impact, their bioactivity and effectiveness in health care products and theirselling proposition potential as drug candidates. Emphasis is on agents that control or inhibit inflammatory processes, dementia and

cancer. Secondary metabolites responsible for biological effects are identified in the natural matrix. They areeither isolated and purified in the search for new potential lead compounds, or characterized and standardized toensure a safe and efficient application of herbal preparations. The variety of research interests in our groupenables a broad and interdisciplinary access to various fields of plant science. The high number of internationaland national co-operations in various research areas related and complementary to our existing ones (e.g. phar-macology, molecular biology, chemometrics, and microbiology to botany) contributes to the groups’ multidiscipli-nary research activities of high quality.

Running projects www.uibk.ac.at/pharmazie/pharmakognosie/forschungsschwerpunkte

University of Graz, Department of Pharmacogonsy

Name and address: Institute of Pharmaceutical Sciences, Department of Pharmacognosy, Universitätsplatz 4, A-8010 Graz, Austriatel +43-316-380-5525

Homepage: http://www.kfunigraz.ac.at/phgwww/

Staff: Rudolf Bauer Univ. Prof. Dr.Pharmacist, Head of the Institute and of the Departmente-mail: rudolf.bauer@uni-graz.at

Expertise: Quality control and standardization of herbal drugs and herbal medicinal products; activity guidedisolation and structure elucidation of plant constituents; pharmacological screening of plant constituents with anti-inflammatory and immunomodulatory activity; search for compounds with inhibitory activity on cyclooxygenase-1/-2and 5-lipoxygenase; NFkB1 and COX2 gene expression; anti-cancer activity; phytochemical and pharmacologicalinvestigation of Echinacea species; phytochemical and pharmacological investigations and quality control ofChinese herbal drugs

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Adelheid Brantner Ao.Univ. Prof. Mag. Dr.Pharmacist; adelheid.brantner@uni-graz.at

Expertise: Research on medicinal plants used in the traditional medicine of Europe, Asia and Africa.Bioassay-guided isolation of active secondary metabolites from plants with special focus on anti-micro-bial, anti-oxidant, anti-inflammatory, anti-tumour activities and other age related diseases using (enzy-matic) in vitro assays (AChE inhibition, elastase inhibition). Quality assurance regarding chemical andmicrobiological aspects. Standardisation of herbal medicinal products.

Franz Bucar Ao. Univ.-Professor Mag. Dr.Pharmacist; franz.bucar@uni-graz.at

Expertise: Isolation of active plant constituents from medicinal plants of traditional medicines withspecial emphasis on antimycobacterial activity including resistance modulation; antioxidative activity andanti-inflammatory activity. Analysis of plant extracts and herbal medicinal products by hyphenatedmethods (GC-MS, LC-PDA-MS).

Further coworkers Dr. Wolfgang Schühly, Mag. Dr. Eva Wenzig, Mag. Dr. Karin Wölkart; 2 post docs, 10 PhD studentsin the Department:

Working areas: At the Department of Pharmacognosy, studies of plants used in European, American, African and Asian traditionalmedicine are conducted with the goals of identifying active constituents, discovering new lead compounds, anddeveloping new herbal medicinal products.

Analysis and Quality ControlThe safety of herbal medicinal products is an important part of the esteem of phytomedicine. Evaluation of culti-vated medicinal plants as well as support in the process of standardization and quality control are offered by theDepartment. TLC, GC, GC-MS, HPLC and LC-MS are regularly used in analyses and quality control. Centres ofinterest are the development of monographs for the European Pharmacopoeia Commission and expertise inEuropean regulatory affairs for herbal medicinal products such as the development of quality control methods forEuropean and Chinese herbs.

Bioassay Guided IsolationMain interests are in the field of plant constituents with anti-in- flammatory, immunomodulatory, anti-oxidant, anti-cancer as well as antimicrobial /antimycobacterial activities. In-vitro assays for inhibition of leukotriene biosynthe-sis in human granulocytes by 5-LOX, inhibition of 12(S)-HETE formation by 12-LOX in human platelets, inhibitionof prostaglandin biosynthesis by COX-1 and COX-2 enzymes, inhibition of NFkB gene expression in humanfibroblasts as well as modulation of mycobacterial resistance, are established in our Department for the screeningand testing of extracts and pure compounds.

Pharmacodynamic and Pharmacokinetic Studies with EchinaceaDesigning and conducting biopharmaceutical and pharmacokinetic studies on bioactive constituents of herbalmedicinal products is annother new field of interest. Alkamides from Echinacea species have been investigatedfor their bioavailability and for their molecular mode of action.

8 publications, Abebe Wube, A., Bucar, F., Gibbons, S., Asres, K. (2005) Sesquiterpenes from Warburgia ugandensis and theirrepresenting the antimycobacterial activity. Phytochemistry 66, 2309–2315.working group: Adams, M., Abebe Wube, A., Kunerth, O., Haslinger, E., Bucar, F., Bauer, R., Quinolone Alkaloids from Evodia

rutaecarpa: A Potent new Group of Antimycobacterial Compounds. Int. J. Antimicrob. Agents 26(3), 262–264 (2005)Adams M, Wiedenmann M, Tittel G, Bauer R.., HPLC-MS trace analysis of atropine in Lycium barbarum berries.Phytochem Anal. 17(5): 279–83 (2006)Brantner, AH, Asres, K, Chakraborty, A, Tokuda, H, Mou, XY, Mukainaka T, Nishino H, Stoyanova, S, Hamburger,M. Crown gall – a plant tumour with biological activities. Phytother Res. 2003; 17(4):385–90.Chakraborty A, Brantner AH. Study of alkaloids from Adhatoda vasica Nees on their antiinflammatory activity.Phytother Res. 2001; 15(6):532–4.Wölkart, K., Xu, W., Pei, Y., Makriyannis, A., Picone, R.P.,Bauer, R., The endocannabinoid system as a target foralkamides from Echinacea angustifolia roots. Planta Medica 71, 701–705 (2005)Wölkart, K., Marth, Suter, A., Schoop, R., Raggam, R.B., Koidl, C., Kleinhappl, B., Bauer, R., Bioavailability andpharmacokinetic of Echinacea purpurea preparations and their interaction with the immune system. Int J ClinPharmacol Ther. 44(9), 401–8 (2006)Wube, A. A., Wenzig, E.-M., Gibbons, S., Asres, K., Bauer, R., Bucar, F. (2007) Constituents of the stem bark ofDiscopodium penninervium and their LTB4, COX-1 and -2 inhibitory activities. Phytochemistry, in print.

The “speciality” or The Graz Department of Pharmacognosy owns a unique combination of expertises in the fields of Pharma-the unique selling cognosy, Pharmaceutical Biology, ranging from Ethnopharmacognosy, Phytochemistry to Molecular Pharma-proposition: cology. The basic aims of the Department are i) the identification of new and pharmacologically active natural

products, and ii) the assurance of the quality of herbal medicinal drugs.Special expertise exists with Chinese and other Asian herbal drugs.

Running projects: The Department is participating in the 6th FW EU research project SAFEWASTES. The objective is to recovervaluable compounds from plant derived waste materials for use in food and feed additives with significant healthbenefits for animals and human beings. http://www.safewastes.info

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FWF funded research is conducted on the active constituents of Hypericum species. Research on antimycobacte-rial compounds is funded by Doc-Fforte 22076 (Austrian Academy of Sciences).Special expertise exists in investigations on medicinal plants from Traditional Chinese Medicine. The TCMResearch Center Graz has been established.

University of Vienna, Department of Pharmacognosy

Name and address: University of Vienna, Department of Pharmacognosy, Faculty of Life SciencesAlthanstrasse 14, A-1090 Vienna, Austria

Homepage: http://www.univie.ac.at/pharmakognosie/

Staff: Verena M. Dirsch, Univ. Prof. Dr.; Head of Departmente-mail: verena.dirsch@univie.ac.at

ExpertiseScientific background as pharmaceutical biologist of more than 15 years, especially in the fields of phyto-chemistry/natural product chemistry (Ph.D and postdoc) and molecular pharmacology of natural products. Currentinterest lies in a) molecular mechanisms of natural products with an emphasis on vaso-protective compounds,and b) target-oriented identification of active natural products. Working area (see below): Molecular Targets group

Johann Jurenitsch, Univ. Prof. Mag. Dr.on leave as Vice-rector of the University of Vienna

Brigitte Kopp, Univ. Prof. Mag. Dr. Dr. h. c.; Vice-Head of Department; President of Study Legislation of theUniversity of Viennae-mail brigitte.kopp@univie.ac.at

ExpertiseScientific background as pharmacognosist and/or phytochemist of more than 30 years; research focussing on iso-lation, structure elucidation of natural compounds with immunregulatory, antitumor, spasmolytic, choleretic or anti-inflammatory activities as well as quality control of HMPs from Europe and outside. Plant biotechnology for theproduction of high quality medicinal plants and natural products. Working area (see below): Phytochemistry,Ethnopharmacognosy and Plant Biotechnology group

Sabine Glasl, ao. Univ. Prof. Mag. Dr.e-mail sabine.glasl@univie.ac.at

ExpertiseExperience in the field of phytochemistry and natural product chemistry. Research focuses on isolation, structureelucidation, analytics and quality assessment concerning medicinal plants of Europe, Latin America and Mongo-lia. Working area (see below): Ethnopharmacognosy and Phytochemistry group

Liselotte Krenn, ao. Univ. Prof. Mag. Dr.e-mail liselotte.krenn@univie.ac.at

ExpertiseResearch focussed on bioactivity-guided isolation of natural compounds with histonedeacetylase-modulatory,acetylcholinesterase-inhibitory, estogenic or anti-inflammatory activities as well as on phytochemical quality con-trol of medicinal plants and herbal products and on the optimization of plant extracts for food supplements. Work-ing area (see below): Phytochemistry and Ethnopharmacognosy group

Gottfried Reznicek, ao. Univ. Prof. Mag. Dr.e-mail gottfried.reznicek@univie.ac.at

ExpertisePhytochemical analysis, isolation and structure elucidation of plant constituents; chemotaxonomy of medicinalplants; bioactivity-guided isolation of natural compounds with anti-inflammatory activities; analysis of plant aller-gens; constituents of red wine and their effects on the vascular system; metabolism of natural compounds; qualitycontrol of medicinal plants and herbal products. Working area (see below): Phytochemistry group

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Johannes Saukel, ao. Univ. Prof. Mag. Dr.; Vice-Director of Pharmacy Study Programmee-mail johannes.saukel@univie.ac.at

ExpertiseScientific background as biologist of more than 25 years, especially in the fields of anatomy, morphology, system-atic and biostatistics of medicinal plants. Further interest in ethnopharmacognosy with regard to plants of tradi-tional European medicine (Austria, Germany, northern Italy, Balkan region) and traditional medicine of the Kurdsin Turkey.Working areas: Pharmacobotany and Ethnopharmacognosy group

Christa Kletter, Ass. Prof. Mag. Dr.e-mail christa.kletter@univie.ac.at

ExpertiseScientific background as pharmacist, additional studies in ethnology; research in ethnopharmacognosy focussingon quality control and traditional use with regard to plants of traditional Tibetan medicine, traditional Mongolianmedicine, plant-derived aphrodisiacs of Brazil and the Caribbean islands; microscopy of medicinal plants; historyof pharmacy with special interest in history of drugs and Austrian pharmacy; curator of the historic collections ofthe institute.Working areas: Ethnopharmacognosy and Pharmacobotany group

Christoph Wawrosch, Ass. Prof. Mag. Dr.e-mail christoph.wawrosch@univie.ac.at

ExpertiseLong lasting activity in the field of plant biotechnology, with emphasis on in vitro-propagation of endangeredmedicinal plants, quality improvement, scale-up and automation of (liquid) micropropagation systems, and appli-cation of organ cultures for the in vitro-production of secondary metabolites. Working area (see below): PlantBiotechnology group

Further coworkers: Dr. Elke Heiss, Mag. Dr. Sonja Prinz, Mag. Dr. Ingrid WernerGraduate students: 19

Working areas: EthnopharmacognosyThe research focuses on interdisciplinary and intercultural studies on medicinal plants used in traditional medicineand includes in its methods a scientific Western approach and a traditional one.

PhytochemistryIn an effective search for new therapeutic agents the enormous structural diversity of secondary plant metabolitesprovides an indispensable resource.Thus, the phytochemical approach in drug discovery comprises the isolation and characterisation of natural prod-ucts to reveal bioactive compounds and lead structures. These may prompt the possible synthesis of improvedderivatives used as drugs.Our investigations focus on glycosides, phenolics, carbohydrates, alkaloids and terpenoids from different biologi-cal matrices.The pure compounds are tested for their biological activity on the one hand, on the other hand they are essentialfor the development of analytical systems in order to assess the quality of crude drugs and herbal medicinal prod-ucts (extracts, phytopharmaceuticals).

Molecular Targets“Natural products can be viewed as a population of privileged structures selected by evolutionary pressures tointeract with a wide variety of proteins and other biological targets for specific purposes, a view supported by thefact that natural products have become effective drugs in a wide variety of therapeutic indications” (Koehn FE andCarter GT. Nat Rev Drug Discovery 4:206–220, 2005)Our research focus is to understand the molecular interaction of natural products with proteins/signaling mole-cules within cells.Identification of biological targets will help to identify new pharmacological targets for drug discovery & develop-ment.

PharmacobotanyIdentity and purity of the starting material are prerequisites for safety and efficacy of herbal medicinal products.We need strict differential characters in morphology, anatomy and constituents in order to identify the correctplant source and exclude adulterations. We focus on basic research in systematics and taxonomy of medicinalplants, on the development and evaluation of differential characters between correct plant sources and relatedtaxa and on systematic plant anatomy.

Plant BiotechnologyThe principal interests of our group lie in basic and applied research on plant tissue culture of medicinal plants.We focus on plant production through micropropagation as well as on the production of secondary metabolitesthrough organ and cell culture.

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8 publications, Trauner G, Khom S, Baburin I, Benedek B, Hering S, Kopp B. Modulation of GABAA Receptors by Valerianrepresenting the Extracts is related to the Content of Valerenic Acid. Planta Med, in press, 2007.working group: Heiss EH, Schilder YDC, Dirsch VM. Chronic treatment with resveratrol induces redox stress- and ATM-depend-

ent senescence in p53-positive cancer cells. J Biol Chem. 282:26759–66, 2007.Pemp E, Reznicek G, Krenn L. Fast quantification of flavonoids in Filipendulae ulmariae flos by HPLC/ESI-MSusing a non porous stationary phase. J. Anal. Chem. 62, 669–673, 2007.Glasl S, Tsendayush D, Batchimeg U, Holec N, Wurm E, Kletter Ch, Gunbilig D, Daariimaa Kh, Narantuya S,Thalhammer Th. Choleretic Effects of the Mongolian Medicinal Plant Saussurea amara in the Isolated PerfusedRat Liver. Planta Medi 73: 59–66, 2007.Werner I, Glasl S, Reznicek G. Infrared Spectroscopy as a Tool for Chemotaxonomic Investigations within theAchillea millefolium Group. Chemistry & Biodiversity 3, 27–33, 2006.Guo Y P, Saukel J, Mittermayr R, Ehrendorfer F. AFLP analyses demonstrate genetic divergence, hybridization,and multiple polyploidization in the evolution of Achillea (Asteraceae-Anthemideae). New Phytologist, 166:273–290, 2005.Kongbangkerd A, Köpf A, Allacher P, Wawrosch Ch, Kopp B. Micropropagation of Squill (Charybdis numidica)through nodule culture. Plant Cell Rep, 23: 673–677, 2005.Kletter Ch, Glasl S, Presser A, Werner I, Reznicek G, Narantuya S, Cellek S, Haslinger E, Jurenitsch J. Morpho-logical, chemical and functional analysis of Catuaba preparations. Planta Med 70: 993–1000, 2004.

The “speciality” or The Vienna Department of Pharmacognosy shows a unique combination of expertises in the field of Pharma-the unique selling cognosy/Pharmaceutical Biology, ranging from Ethnopharmacognosy, Pharmacobotany and Phytochemistry toproposition: Molecular Pharmacology and non-recombinant Plant Biotechnology. By mutual application of methods from all

these fields the fundamental aims of the Department i) the identification of new and pharmacologically activenatural products, and ii) the assurance of the quality of herbal medicinal drugs are approached and provide newinsights in the potential of herbal medicinal plants and their secondary metabolites.

Running projects: http://www.univie.ac.at/pharmakognosie/

The Herbal Medicinal Products PlatformAustria (HMPPA) represents a novel andunique national academic network withhighest expertise in the fields of phytomed-icine and natural products research.

The platform fosters research, knowledge-management, education, application andtraining in natural product research andphyto-pharmaceutical medicine. It ad-dresses bottlenecks in R & D, encouragestranslational research, serves as a refer-ence and advisory institution in all scientificresearch, development and product issuesregarding herbal medicine and naturalproducts.

It aims at a close collaboration between ac-ademia, government(s), the EuropeanMedicines Agency including its herbal me-dicinal products committee and the phyto-pharmaceutical industry to support the dis-covery and development of natural productbased drug leads and herbal remedies.

The importance of natural products is in-creasing not only as a source of new drugleads in the field of drug discovery, but alsoin the area of basic research, such as in theexpanding field of chemical biology. Thus,a national research network shall strive toaccelerate the discovery and developmentprocess along a new concept especiallydesigned for the screening, isolation and

identification of new natural lead-com-pounds from crude plant extracts.

Due to the increasing importance of tradi-tional Chinese medicine in western coun-tries, the platform is also involved in the es-tablishment of a research cluster on TCMin Austria which shall result in a close sci-entific collaboration and scientific ex-change between top scientists in Chinaand Austria.

President: Prof. Dr. Hermann Stuppner;Vice-President: Prof. Dr. Chlodwig Franz,Prof. Dr. Brigitte Kopp; Head for TCM af-fairs: Prof. Dr. Rudolf Bauer

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Recent thesis on Medicinal Plant Research(Notices of Ph.D- and diploma theses to the editor are welcome any time!)

Ph.D.thesis (2006) Effects of Salvia offici-nalis in the liver: Relevance of glutathionelevels. By: Cristovao F. Lima. Supervisor:Dr. Cristina Pereira-Wilson, Department ofBiology, School of Sciences, University ofMinho, Braga, Portugal.

PhD thesis (2007) Anxiolytic activity ofApocynum venetum L. and its proposedmechanism of action. By: Oliver Grund-mann. Promotor: Prof. Dr. Veronika Butter-weck, Department of Pharmaceutics, Col-lege of Pharmacy, University of Florida,Gainesville, USA

PhD thesis (2007) Xanthine oxidase inhibi-tion and antioxidant activities of Cynarascolymus L. and its compounds. By: Sasi-porn Sarawek. Promotor: Prof. Dr. Vero-nika Butterweck, Department of Pharma-ceutics, College of Pharmacy, University ofFlorida, Gainesville, USA

Ph.D. thesis (2007) Phytochemical charac-terisation of oily extracts from herbal drugs– efficiency and quality of the extraction. ByMichael Heldmaier; Promotor: Prof. Dr. E.Stahl-Biskup, Institute of Pharmacy, Uni-versity of Hamburg, Germany.

Diploma thesis (2007) Massenvermehrungvon Sonnentau im TIS. By: Tatjana Dorfer;Promotor: Prof. B. Kopp, Department ofPharmacognosy, University of Vienna, Aus-tria.

Diploma thesis (2007) Phytochemicalanalysis of phenolic compounds in differentAchillea species. By: Noela Gjoncay; Pro-motor: Prof. B. Kopp, Department of Phar-macognosy, University of Vienna, Austria.

Diploma thesis (2007) Traditionelle Medizinin Nicaragua – Praktiken und Arzneimittelzweier Curadores aus den Bezirken ElSauce und San Lucas. By: Renate Hofer;Promotor: Prof. L. Krenn, Department ofPharmacognosy, University of Vienna, Aus-tria.

Diploma thesis (2007) Untersuchung phe-nolischer Inhaltsstoffe in Grindelia robusta.By: Daniela Nadler; Promotor: Prof. L.Krenn, Department of Pharmacognosy,University of Vienna, Austria

Diploma thesis (2007) FT-IR spectroscopyand chemometrics in the differentiation ofPeucedanum palustre species in Finland.By: Susanne Wilflingseder; Promotor: Prof.B. Kopp, Department of Pharmacognosy,University of Vienna, Austria.

Diploma thesis (2007) Isolierung undStrukturklärung apolarer Inhalststoffe vonMetaxya rostrata. By: Simone Metnitzer;Promotor: Prof. L. Krenn, Department ofPharmacognosy, University of Vienna, Aus-tria.

Diploma thesis (2007) Die OrganisationCecalli – Ein Modell für die Integrationvolksmedizinischer Praktiken und pflanz-licher Heilmittel in die Gesundheitsvor-sorge Nicaraguas. By Johanna Hehen-berger; Promotor: Prof. L. Krenn, Depart-ment of Pharmacognosy, University ofVienna, Austria.

Diploma thesis (2007) Analyse von Pflan-zenextrakten mittels HPLC. By: Robert Art-ner; Promotor: Prof. L. Krenn, Departmentof Pharmacognosy, University of Vienna,Austria.

Diploma thesis (2007) A contribution forquality of Aconitum species in TCM andActaea racemosa L. By: Judith Singhuber;Promotor: Prof. B. Kopp, Department ofPharmacognosy, University of Vienna, Aus-tria.

Master thesis (2007) Plants against obesity– A survey of ethnomedicinal uses andpharmacological and clinical studies. By:Julie Beyeler; Promotor: Prof. M. Ham-burger, Institute of Pharmaceutical Biology,Basel

Master thesis (2007) Die Effekte von Natur-stoffen auf die Produktion von reaktivenSauerstoff-Spezies. By: Chantal Pfäffli;Promotor: Prof. Dr. M. Hamburger, Dr. P.Küenzi, Institute of Pharmaceutical Biology,Basel

Master thesis (2007) Natural products act-ing on targets implicated in Alzheimer’s dis-ease. By: Nassiba Khenissi; Promotor:Prof. Dr. Hamburger, Institute of Pharma-ceutical Biology, Basel

Master thesis (2007) Antioxidantien: Mole-kulare Targets und therapeutische Rele-vanz. By: Andrea Walther; Promotors: Prof.Dr. M. Hamburger, Dr. O. Potterat, Instituteof Pharmaceutical Biology, Basel

Master thesis (2007) PCR – based profilingof Leuzea carthamoides extract. By: Patri-cia Iseli; Promotors: Prof. Dr. M. Ham-burger, Dr. P. Küenzi, Institute of Pharma-ceutical Biology, Basel

Master thesis (2007) Qualitative and quan-titative analysis of glucosinolates in woad(Isatis tinctoria, Brassicaceae). By: KathrinSuter; Promotor: Prof. Dr. M. Hamburger,Institute of Pharmaceutical Biology, Basel

Master thesis (2007) Chemisches Profilingder Inhaltsstoffe aus Açai – Euterpe olera-cea Mart. By: Sandra Schurr; Promotors:Prof. Dr. M. Hamburger, Dr. O. Potterat, In-stitute of Pharmaceutical Biology, Basel

Master thesis (2007) Goji-Saft (Lycium bar-barum) – ein traditionelles Produkt auf demVormarsch. Was steckt dahinter? Promo-tors: Prof. Dr. M. Hamburger, Dr. O. Pot-terat, Institute of Pharmaceutical Biology,Basel

Diploma thesis, 2007, Phytochemischerund biopharmazeutischer Vergleich vonGinkgo-Präparaten. By Elisabeth Feizl-mayr, promotor: Prof. Dr. R. Bauer; Inst.Pharm. Sci., University of Graz (Austria).

Diploma thesis, 2007, Phytochemische Un-tersuchungen von Drynaria propinqua(Wall.) J. Sm. und Magnolia grandiflora L.By Stefan von Ehrenstein, promotor: Prof.Dr. R. Bauer; Inst. Pharm. Sci., Universityof Graz (Austria).

Diploma thesis, 2007, Chinesische Arznei-drogen der pharmakognostischen Samm-lung des Instituts für PharmazeutischeWissenschaften der Universität Graz. ByChristine Grabner, promotor: Prof. Dr. R.Bauer; Inst. Pharm. Sci., University of Graz(Austria).

Diploma thesis, 2007, Phytochemische Un-tersuchungen von Hypericum mutilum L..By Elfe Hammer, promotor: Prof. Dr. R.Bauer; Inst. Pharm. Sci., University of Graz(Austria).

Editorial remark

All contributions for the GA-News-letter are welcome. Deadline forsubmission for the next edition isfixed to May 30st. 2008. Pleasesend all contributions to: Prof. Dr. A.Hensel, University of Münster, Insti-tute for Pharmaceutical Biology andPhytochemistry, Hittorfstrase 56, D-48149 Münster, Germany; ahensel@uni-muenster.de