Pierre Duez

University of Mons · Department of Therapeutic Chemistry and Pharmacognosy

The present study aimed to qualitatively assess the influence of Chenopodium quinoa Willd. varieties (INIAP-Tunkahuan, INIAP-Pata de Venado varieties and Chimborazo genotype), phenological stages (40, 60, and 80 days), and places of cultivation (Pichincha and Chimborazo Ecuadorian provinces) on the leaf and seed phenolic composition and biological...

Background Essential oils of Cymbopogon citratus and Hyptis suaveolens are known for their insecticidal properties, but remain ineffective against mosquitoes resistant to synthetic insecticides. In order to improve insecticidal properties of these plants, this study aimed to investigate the chemical composition and insecticidal activity against Ano...

Ethnopharmacological relevance Knowledge of the high-sale medicinal plants and their authentication are essential parameters to ensure the safety of people using herbal medicine and to plan the safeguarding of medicinal species threatened with extinction. Aims The present study, carried out in Lubumbashi, Democratic Republic of Congo, aimed to geol...

i>Justicia secunda Vahl (Acanthaceae) is a tropical herbaceous plant traditionally used by indigenous peoples of the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) to treat symptoms associated with sickle cell disease (SCD), a genetic condition with life-threatening complications. Given the lack of side-effect-free drugs, alternative herbal therapies that...

In order to evaluate the efficacy of the root bark powder of Oldfieldia dactylophylla (Welw. ex Oliv.) J. Léonard (a Picrodendraceae), 32 locally breed grazing goats naturally infested with various gastrointestinal helminths were randomly assigned to four groups of eight animals: one untreated control, one positive control group treated with a refe...

Grangea maderaspatana belonging to Asteraceae family is used for its pharmacological properties. The aim of this study is a bio-guided antioxidant compounds characterization of Grangea maderaspatana roots extracts. Extracts were obtained using hexane, dichloromethane, ethyl acetate and methanol. Each crude extract was tested for its free radical sc...

Recent findings from the World Heart Federation (WHF) reported a significant increase in cardiovascular disease (CVD)-related deaths, highlighting the urgent need for effective prevention strategies. Atherosclerosis, a key precursor to CVD, involves the accumulation of low-density lipoprotein (LDL) and its oxidation within the endothelium, leading...

Background: In Burundi, five plants, namely Urtica massaica Mildbr., Mikania natalensis DC., Senecio maranguensis O. Hoffm., Justicia nyassana Lindau and Helichrysum congolanum Schltr. & O. Hoffm., are widely cited for the treatment of infectious diseases. The present work aims to compare the local knowledge and uses of these five popular anti-infe...

Psidium guajava is one of the most common edible medicinal plants frequently used in Malagasy traditional medicine to treat gastrointestinal infections. In order to evaluate their probable antibacterial activities, three organic extracts (successive extractions by hexane, dichloromethane, and ethanol) of ripe guava fruits were assessed for their ba...

Although non-alcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD) presents as an intricate condition characterized by a growing prevalence, the often-recommended lifestyle interventions mostly lack high-level evidence of efficacy and there are currently no effective drugs proposed for this indication. The present review delves into NAFLD pathology, its diverse un...

Malgré le risque d’usage, la croissance du marché incontrôlé des plantes médicinales reste moins renseignée dans la région de Lubumbashi. Pour comprendre son fonctionnement, une enquête a été initiée auprès de 118 tradipraticiens et herboristes, choisis de manière raisonnée. Les données recueillies renseignent que 85 % des praticiens exerçaient ce...

p>Essential oils (EO) of Mentha piperita L. and Cymbopogon citratus (DC.) Stapf is a potential source of molecules with bioparasiticidal activity. The development of optimized combinations of these natural substances would allow them to be used as biopesticides. Thus, the objective of this study is to determine the biopesticide efficacy of EO obtai...

Malgré le risque d’usage, la croissance du marché incontrôlé des plantes médicinales reste moins renseignée dans la région de Lubumbashi. Pour comprendre son fonctionnement, une enquête a été initiée sur 118 tradipraticiens et herboristes, choisis de manière raisonnée. Les informations recueillies renseignent 85% des praticiens, exercent ce commerc...

Natural products are generally considered as safe and reliable, whereas they could represent a real danger for public health. Indeed, many herbs are either directly reactive towards DNA or likely to disturb cellular homoeostasis, cell cycle and/or genome maintenance mechanisms. Genotoxicity refers to the deleterious effect of a chemical compound or...

The interaction between SARS-CoV-2 spike RBD and ACE2 proteins is a crucial step for host cell infection by the virus. Without it, the entire virion entrance mechanism is compromised. The aim of this study was to evaluate the capacity of various natural product classes, including flavonoids, anthraquinones, saponins, ivermectin, chloroquine, and er...

Introduction Fadogiella stigmatoloba, Hygrophylla auriculata, Hylodesmum repandum and Porphyrostemma chevalieri are used against malaria in traditional medicine in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC). To evaluate their potential in the treatment of this disease, the in vitro antiplasmodial property of these four plants was evaluated. All exp...

In the last decades, the medical practice has been facing noteworthy transformations driven by the advancement of innovative technologies like Artificial Intelligence (AI). This rapid and widespread transition generated the increasing need for an adequate education curriculum, capable of properly teaching medical students about the prospects and po...

Les huiles essentielles constituent une source potentielle de molécules à activité antioxydante. Le développement des combinaisons optimisées de ces substances naturelles permettrait leur utilisation comme conservateurs naturels. Ainsi, l’objectif de la présente étude est de déterminer la composition chimique de l’huile essentielle obtenue par co-d...

Phenolamides are abundant specialized metabolites found in nature and consist of hydroxycinnamic acids mono- or polyconjugated with polyamines. Their participation in flower development is well-documented, and their presence in pollen raises the question of their role in pollen/pollinator interactions. The structural characterization of phenolamide...

Gastrointestinal parasite (GIP) infections control has an important role to play in increasing livestock production from a limited natural resource base and to improve animal health and welfare. This study aimed to collect indigenous knowledge and identify wild plants locally used by goat smallholders of three territories of Haut-Katanga province f...

Sickle cell disease (SCD) is an autosomal recessive blood disorder characterized by red blood cells that assume an abnormal, rigid sickle shape under low-oxygen conditions. These sickle-shaped erythrocytes tend to lyse, aggregate, and obstruct small blood vessels, leading to major complications. The present study aims to investigate properties that...

The reduction of K2Cr2O7 solutions by H2O2 was studied by NMR relaxometry and UV‐Vis spectroscopy in HCl/KCl buffer (pH2), NaCl/Glycine/HCl buffer (pH3) and sodium acetate/acetic acid buffer (pH4). Because of Cr (III) paramagnetism, 1/T1 and 1/T2 of the solutions increase during the reduction of diamagnetic Cr (VI). This increase is proportional to...

Herbal remedies used in traditional medicine often contain several compounds combined in order to potentiate their own intrinsic properties. However, herbs can sometimes cause serious health troubles. In Belgium, patients who developed severe aristolochic acid nephropathy ingested slimming pills containing root extracts of an Aristolochia species,...

The objective of this study was to determine the chemical composition of essential oil obtained by co-distillation of Cymbopogon citratus and Eucalyptus camaldulensis and to compare its antifungal activity with that of the mixture obtained by combining the pure essential oils of the two plants. Essential oils were obtained by hydrodistillation of t...

Background : Flavonoids and saponins are important bioactive compounds that have attracted wide research interests. This review aims to summarise the state of the art of the pharmacology, toxicology and clinical efficacy of these compounds. Methods : Data were retrieved from PubMed, Cochrane Library, Web of Science, Proquest, CNKI, Chongqing VIP,...

Objectives Considering that the 3 Rs of regulation (replacing, reducing, and refining) are meant to reduce the number and suffering of research animals and that current two-dimension (2D) in vitro and animals models do not completely mimic the human presentation of the disease, there is a growing demand to develop alternative models. Therefore, we...

Tetrahydroisoquinoline (THIQ) alkaloids and their derivatives have a structural similarity to 1-methyl-4-phenyl-1,2,3,6-tetrahydropyridine (MPTP), a well-known neurotoxin. THIQs seem to present a broad range of actions in the brain, critically dependent on their catechol moieties and metabolism. These properties make it reasonable to assume that an...

Cardiovascular diseases (CVD) and cancers are the two main causes of death worldwide. The initiation and progression of atherosclerosis is, in large part, caused by oxidized low-density lipoproteins (oxLDL); interestingly, oxLDL may also play a role in cancer cell metabolism and migration. As oxLDL are generally obtained by tedious ultracentrifugat...

In the Democratic Republic of Congo, the desire of the Ministry of Health to integrate Traditional African Medicine into the Official Health System remains limited by the lack of reliable data on several aspects of this medicine. This study aims to determine the perceptions of the Lubumbashi population towards Traditional African Medicine and the c...

Background: An effective use of surgical antibiotic prophylaxis (SAP) appears essential to prevent the development of infections linked to surgery while inappropriate and excessive prescriptions of prophylactic antibiotics increase the risk of adverse effects, bacterial resistance and Clostridium difficile infections. In this study, we aimed to an...

Recently, the xanthophyll carotenoid lutein has been qualified as a potential quorum sensing (QS) and biofilm inhibitor against Pseudomonas aeruginosa. To address the potential of this xanthophyll compound as a relevant antivirulence agent, we investigated in depth its impact on the invasion capabilities and aggressiveness of P. aeruginosa PAO1, wh...

Research studies about the effect of environmental agents on the accumulation of phenolic compounds in medicinal plants are required to establish a set of optimal growth conditions. Hence, in this work, we considered the impact of habitat types, soil composition, climatic factors, and altitude on the content of phenolics in Mentha species [M. puleg...

In this work, a simple, fast (10 min) and environmentally friendly extraction method using deep eutectic solvents (DES), based on choline chloride and glycerol, was established to extract saponins from five quinoa samples: a) husks of bitter seeds, b) bitter seeds, c) water-washed bitter seeds, d) sweet seeds of the INIAP-Tunkahuan variety, and e)...

The availability of scientific information useful for the orientation of artisanal and industrial tinctorial practices to ensure the protection of the environment and the health of artisans and consumers remains a major concern for a large number of actors. Qualitative, quantitative analyses and structural identifications works using spectrophotome...

Anthocyanins are bioactive compounds which, due to their free radical scavenging properties, can protect the human body against oxidative stress that can cause many diseases, such as cancer, aging. The Tuskegee purple Cap Vert and Tuskegee purple sweet potato (Ipomoea batatas L.) varieties are rich in anthocyanins. Indeed, their total anthocyanin c...

Aim This study investigated the effect of neutral lipids of Nigella sativa seed on hyperglycemia and serum lipid status in Nicotinamide/Streptozotocin (N/STZ)-induced diabetic rats. Materials and Methods Extraction of Nigella sativa oil was carried out using methanol/chloroform extraction. Neutral lipids were obtained by fractionation on silica ge...

Medicinal plants have been used for a very long time to improve human health; they are gaining increasing popularity globally as drugs, complementary and alternative medicines, food supplements, cosmetics and, more surprisingly, as medical devices. The complexity of herbs and extracts, supplied to such a wide range of markets and in different requl...

Medicinal plants have been used for a very long time to improve human health; they are gaining increasing popularity globally as drugs, complementary and alternative medicines, food supplements, cosmetics and, more surprisingly, as medical devices. The complexity of herbs and extracts, supplied to such a wide range of markets and in different requl...

Anthocyanins are bioactive compounds, which thanks to their anti-free radical properties, can protect the human body against oxidative stress. The latter can cause many diseases, such as cancer, aging. The extract of the green cap purple variety of the sweet potato (Ipomoea batatas L.) is active against the radical ABTS. Its antioxidant content is...

Extracts from Croton kongenis present anticancer activities on various cancers. However, there is no research conducted to investigate the effects of Croton kongenis extracts on cervical cancer as well as on zebrafish. In this study, we demonstrated that Croton kongenis ethanol extract expressed high toxicity to cervical cancer Hela cells with an I...

The selection of appropriate food resources by bees is a critical aspect for the maintenance of their populations, especially in the current context of global change and pollinator decline. Wild bees have a sophisticated ability to forage selectively on specific resources, and can assess the quality of pollen using contact chemosensory perception (...

Obesity is characterized by an excessive body mass, but is also closely associated with metabolic syndrome. And, so far, only limited pharmacological treatments are available for obesity management. Celastrol, a pentacyclic triterpenoid from a traditional Chinese medicine (Tripterygium wilfordii Hook.f.), has shown remarkable potency against obesit...

Translesion synthesis is a DNA damage tolerance mechanism that relies on a series of specialized DNA polymerases able to bypass a lesion on a DNA template strand during replication or post-repair synthesis. Specialized translesion synthesis DNA polymerases pursue replication by inserting a base opposite to this lesion, correctly or incorrectly depe...

In this study, we showed that crude extract of Anisomeles indica (AI-EtE) expressed its toxicity to HeLa cells with an IC50 dose of 38.8 µg/mL and to zebrafish embryos with malformations, lethality and hatching inhibition at 72-hpf at doses higher than 75 µg/mL. More interestingly, flow cytometry revealed that AI-EtE significantly promoted the numb...

Malaria is a parasitic disease, endemic in many tropical and sub-tropical countries. Malaria is a well-known disease, familiar to almost all people in endemic regions, as they or their family are regularly confronted with it; everyone in these regions has probably experienced the disease, at least once in their life. To investigate the social perce...

Chlorophylls a and b, phenolic compounds, carotenoids in total antioxidants from the leaves of eleven varieties of orange and purple sweet potatoes were assessed by spectrophotometry. Using the ABTS method, BF59XCIP1 (43.450 mg ET/g) has the highest antioxidant content ahead of BF59XCIP4, TUSKEGEE- POURPRE CAP VERT and TIB17 (40.969 mg ET/g) and TU...

Cross-sectional study : 390 serum samples were collected from patients suffering undifferentiated febrile illness (UFI) between 2015-2017 around Lubumbashi, DRC. Samples were analyzed at the Friedrich-Loeffler-Institute in Germany for the seroprevalence against RVFV and CCHFV (Vector Best ELISA kit for CCHFV IgM and IgG and IDVET ELISA kit for RVFV...

This study was carried out in order to investigate the safety of Drepanoalpha hard hard capsules, a phytomedicine used for the management of sickle cell disease in the Democratic Republic of Congo by the acute and sub-acute administration in Guinea pigs. The hard capsules were dissolved in saline normal solution (NaCl 0.9 %). The animals were rando...

Dialium angolense is used in Bagira for its various medicinal properties particularly in the management of infectious diseases. In this study, the methanol and aqueous extracts of leaves and fruits were evaluated for their in vitro antioxidant and antimicrobial properties and their in vivo toxicity on Cavia porcellus. The major phytochemical classe...

The worldwide emergence of antibiotic-resistant bacteria and the thread of widespread superbug infections have led researchers to constantly look for novel effective antimicrobial agents. Within the past two decades, there has been an increase in studies attempting to discover molecules with innovative properties against pathogenic bacteria, notabl...

Introduction Les remèdes phytothérapiques associent souvent plusieurs composés censés potentialiser leurs propriétés intrinsèques. En Belgique, il est probable que les patientes ayant développé une néphropathie aux acides aristolochiques (AA) aient ingéré des racines broyées d’Aristolochia mais aussi des écorces de Magnolia officinalis dont certain...

Monolignols are the building blocks for lignin polymerization in the apoplastic domain. Monolignol biosynthesis, transport, storage, glycosylation, and deglycosylation are the main biological processes partaking in their homeostasis. In Arabidopsis thaliana, members of the uridine diphosphate-dependent glucosyltransferases UGT72E and UGT72B subfami...

H-NMR-based metabolomics have been applied to identify potential NMR-markers and biomarkers capable of distinguishing qualifying and classifying three Mentha species:- Mentha pulegium L., Mentha × rotundifolia (L.) Huds., Mentha spicata L., and their ecotypes. Samples of the 3 species were collected in seven different locations in Algeria, with the...

Reçu le 30/08/2020-Accepté après corrections le 16/12/ 2020) Résumé : Pour disposer de colorants naturels prêts à l'emploi pour les artisans teinturiers, des travaux d'extraction aqueuse et d'analyses quantitatives et qualitatives ont été réalisés sur des colorants textiles totaux obtenus de différents organes de dix plantes tinctoriales du Burkina...

Excessive pollen harvesting by bees can compromise the reproductive success of plants. Plants have therefore evolved different morphological structures and floral cues to narrow the spectrum of pollen feeding visitors. Among “filtering” mechanisms, the chemical and mechanical protection of pollen might shape bee-flower interactions and restrict pol...

Background Malaria remains the first global parasitic endemic disease with more than 400,000 deaths per year; there is a definite need for prevention measures and treatments, but also for rapid and low-cost diagnostic methods. Hemozoin, a detoxification polymer formed from heme by the parasite, and a likely biomarker of infection, has enticed many...

Ethnopharmacological relevance Clerodendrum cyrtophyllum Turcz, a plant belonging to the Verbenaceae family, has been used in traditional medicine for the treatment of various inflammatory diseases in many Asian countries. Aim of the study: The study aimed to evaluate anti-inflammatory properties of the ethanol extract from Clerodendrum cyrthophyll...

Objective: The objective of this study was to investigate the mechanisms underlying anti-embolism and extravasational effects of traditional Chinese medical prescription YiqiHuoxue (YQHX) formula in ApoE-/-mice with cerebral vascular microemboli. Materials and Methods: An ApoE-/-mice model with microemboli was developed by infusing fluorescently la...