Health benefit
Chemical intermediate
Botanical Origin
Taxus baccata L.
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PHARMACEUTICALS
10-Deacetylbaccatin III
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The Active Ingredient
Into the Plant
Botanical Origin
Taxus baccata L.
Type
Pure Molecule
Plant source
Twig and Leaf
Health benefit
Chemical intermediate
Assay
≥96.0% by HPLC
Broad category
Precursor to the anti-cancer molecule Docetaxel
On the pathway to anticancer Docetaxel
10-Deacetylbaccatins are natural molecules isolated by a multistep biosynthetic pathway from the yew tree, acting as precursors to the anticancer drug docetaxel. The key reaction is the acetylation of 10-deacetylbaccatin-III (10-DAB) to obtain baccatin-III, an assumed precursor of docetaxel.
The breakthrough arrived during the 80s, when a group of researchers guided by Pierre Potier – at the forefront of the French school of natural-products chemistry - identified the 10-Deacetylbaccatin III, isolated from Taxus baccata, as a readily accessible starting material for the semisynthesis of anticancer taxanes.
Already in that time, the taxanes attracted attention because of their promising clinical activities as anticancer, altogether with some worries about their limited availability; this generated a wide number of studies aimed to solve this issue.
Finally, the possibility to obtain large quantities of taxanes with a purity grade available for clinical scopes by a biosynthetic pathway, standardized and controlled, was welcomed with lot of enthusiasm.
