A toxicological review of alkaloids

Abstract

Alkaloids are naturally occurring compounds with complex structures found in natural plants. To further improve the understanding of plant alkaloids, this review focuses on the classification, toxicity and mechanisms of action, providing insight into the occurrence of alkaloid-poisoning events and guiding the safe use of alkaloids in food, supplements and clinical applications. Based on their chemical structure, alkaloids can be divided into organic amines, diterpenoids, pyridines, isoquinolines, indoles, pyrrolidines, steroids, imidazoles and purines. The mechanisms of toxicity of alkaloids, including neurotoxicity, hepatoxicity, nephrotoxicity, cardiotoxicity and cytotoxicity, have also been reviewed. Some cases of alkaloid poisoning have been introduced when used as food or clinically, including accidental food poisoning, excessive consumption, and poisoning caused by the improper use of alkaloids in a clinical setting, and the importance of safety evaluation was illustrated. This review summarizes the toxicity and mechanism of action of alkaloids and provides evidence for the need for the safe use of alkaloids in food, supplements and clinical applications.

Keywords:

• Alkaloid
• toxicity
• classification
• toxicological mechanism
• alkaloid poisoning

Acknowledgements

We would like to thank MogoEdit (https://www.mogoedit.com) for its English editing during the preparation of this manuscript.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Data availability statement

All data included in this study are available upon request by contact with the corresponding author.

Additional information

Funding

This work was financially supported by the Natural Science Foundation of Sichuan Province (No.2022NSFSC0577), Xinglin Scholar Research Promotion Project of Chengdu University of TCM (MPRC2022024).