What is and what should never be: artifacts, improbable phytochemicals, contaminants and natural products

Abstract

The scope of this review is to sensitize the natural product chemists to the underestimated problem related to artifact, comprising contaminants and improbable natural compounds. This review wants to give an overview about the various facets of this problem and to provide some hints to avoid incurring these situations. It does not pretend to report exhaustively about all the cases available in literature. The issue of artifacts has always existed and is quite impossible to completely eliminate because the results of phytochemical analysis are known only at the end of the work and in many cases there is not the possibility to compare the results. Therefore, it is important to take the necessary precautions during the workout in order to minimize the possibility that an unexpected event may occur. In second instance, anyone involved in these studies should increase the level of self-criticism with respect to the obtained experimental results.

Keywords:

• Artifacts
• contaminants
• unwanted reactions
• improbable natural products

Acknowledgement

I want to really give a special thanks to Professor Armandodoriano Bianco, Editor in Chief of Natural Product Research, because he strongly encouraged me to undertake the drafting of this review paper. Because during our editorial work for this journal, we often find manuscripts reporting about evident artifacts and/or unlikely natural products which, generally, are considered as new compounds of natural origin.

Disclosure statement

There is no conflict of interest among all authors.