Deguelia duckeana in vitro establishment and triterpenes callus production

Deguelia duckeana (Fabaceae) is an endemic plant from the Brazilian Amazonian Rain Forest which is producer of flavonoids, stilbenes and lignans which showed antituberculosis, antibacterial, antifungal and antitumoral activities. In order to find out if in vitro plant cell cultures are able to produce the same kind of substances as the mother plant, the present work was proposed. So, the present study deals with the in vitro establishment and callus induction from D. duckeana . Callus were dried and extracted with hexane/ethyl acetate (1:1) and methanol and further subjected to chemical fractionation. The phytochemical study of the hexane/ethyl acetate and methanol extracts allowed the isolation of the triterpenes: lupeol, lupen-3-al-3β-hidroxi-20(29)-lupen-28-al (betulinaldehyde) and betulinic acid, which structures were elucidated by Nuclear Magnetic Resonance (NMR) analysis. This is the first report of callus induction from D. duckeana , which showed to be a producer of important bioactive substances but different from the mother plant collected in nature.