Thompson, Katz and Sheehan: Chemical comparison of Prunus africana bark and pygeum products marketed for prostate health.

New publication from Rob Thompson, Professor of Chemistry, with senior Daniel Katz and Brendan Sheehan (OC'18, biochemistry).

Chemical comparison of Prunus africana bark and pygeum products marketed for prostate health.
Journal of Pharmaceutical and Biomedical Analysis Vol. 163, 30 January 2019, pp. 162-169

Access this title at the OhioLINK Electronic Journal Center or at the publisher's site, Elsevier's ScienceDirect.

From the introduction and conclusions:

"Pygeum is the powdered bark of Prunus africana (also called Pygeum africanum), an evergreen tree that grows across the mountainous regions of Africa. Both the powder and a lipophilic extract are sold commercially under the same name... Ingestion of pygeum has been found to inactivate the androgen receptor and inhibit prostate cancer cell growth."

[Conclusions after chemical analysis of samples of both bark and pygeum powder:]

Harvesting Prunus africana bark. 
Credit: SouthWorld, May 1, 2016

"The amounts per gram of the BPH-active compounds atranorin, atraric acid, total ferulic acid, and total beta-sitosterol and the fractions of free beta-sitosterol were quite different in bark from Prunus africana and in the contents of commercial pygeum capsules, contents purported to be derivatives of the same bark. This was unexpected and suggested that the BPH-active components in commercial pygeum may not be fully sourced from natural materials as labeled. Also unexpected was that no N-butylbenzene sulfonamide was found in any sample. The variation in the composition of four bark samples, two of which were botanical reference materials, demonstrated the need for a phytochemical standard for pygeum, with reference values for the BPH-active compounds studied here."