AltSU scientists use dangerous hogweed to produce a useful remedy to treat psoriasis

Pharmacy students are studying one of the most common weeds in our country – Sosnovsky’s hogweed (Heracléum Sosnówskyi) under the guidance of Vitaly Tsarev, researcher at the laboratory of Industrial Pharmacy and Supercritical Fluid Technologies, and Olga Vysotskaya, Director of the Center for the Development of Technological Entrepreneurship, Technology Transfer and Intellectual Property Management of Altai State University. The leaves and fruits of this plant are rich in essential oils containing furanocoumarins, two of which can help relieve skin diseases. Thus, the first task of the project developers is to obtain pharmacologically active substances from hogweed to treat psoriasis, and the second is to eliminate the uncontrolled thickets of this plant.

A team of young scientists led by Yulia Pirozhenko, a third-year student of the Institute of Chemistry and Chemical-Pharmaceutical Technologies of Altai State University, are going to use specimens that contain the least amount of heavy metals. This is hogweed growing far from roads, filling fields and meadows.

Young scientists extract the amount of active substances using a Soxhlet extractor. At the same time, they are searching and developing new methods for their isolation: water-dynamic titration, subcritical extraction, etc. In the course of research, AltSU’s students plan to find out which of the possible options can give the best result.

It has already been found that the elements isolated from the plant have unique properties: they do not cause resistance in microorganisms, and they have antiviral and antimicrobial effects. By the way, Moscow Psoriasis Center has been showing interest to the team's project for a long time.

It is worth noting that Sosnovsky’s hogweed began to grow as a silage plant in the middle of the last century, but already in the 90s it began to grow freely, harming agriculture, people and animals, causing skin burns and allergies.
AltSU’s students-pharmacists work with this particular type of hogweed, as with the most dangerous, but with a wide range of uses in the future. Therefore, young scientists plan to obtain a pharmacologically active substance from hogweed and at the same time destroy its thickets.