Preliminary studies on phytochemical constituents of the leaves and fruits of Annona atemoya

Abstract

Annona atemoya is a commercially important fruiting plant belonging to the Annonaceae family. It is widely cultivated in tropical and subtropical continents. It is also known as the custard apple which is a hybrid between two Annonaceae species: (Annona cherimola) and (Annona squamosa). This study aimed to investigate the phytochemical constituents and pharmacological activity of various parts of A. atemoya including leaves, fruits and seeds. The leaves and fruits of A. atemoya were collected in July 2020 from a local farm in Queensland, air dried at room temperature (3 days – 1 week) and then ground to a powder. The leaves and fruits were separately extracted with hexane, ethyl acetate and finally ethanol for three days each. Preliminary results of TLC and NMR experiments indicated the presence of annonaceous acetogenins for the first time in all extracts as pink bands after reacting with Kedde reagent. For the leaves, ethanolic extraction yielded the most polar acetogenins and the ethyl acetate extract was the richest in an abundance of acetogenins containing approximately three separated bands in comparison to the ethanolic and hexane extracts. With regards to the hexane extraction, the concentration of acetogenins was very low and demonstrated the lowest polar acetogenins. All extracts were further purified by chromatography. Future studies will focus on the isolation and characterization of these components and testing of biological activities on various cancer cell lines.