North American plants remain an excellent source for compounds with anticancer potential

One of the most important chemotherapy drugs used clinically today, Taxol®, was discovered from the bark of a North American tree, Taxus brevifolia. Our efforts with plants of North America continue to yield new compounds with significant biological activities against cancer cell lines. The use of bioassays as the sole criteria to guide fractionation, combined with modern chemical techniques, allows the rapid identification of these promising molecules. Approaches for discovery, isolation, synthesis as well as biological assay results of 8 new compounds from diverse North American plants including Amyris texana, Verbesina virginica, Dalea frutescens and Gochnatia hypoleuca will be discussed. New significant biological activities of known compounds can also be uncovered by these methodologies leading to the potential for discovery of targeted therapies from plants for the treatment of cancer.