Progress in the Chemistry of Organic Natural Products 112

Francisco A. Macías was born in La Línea de la Concepción, Cádiz, Spain (1956). He has been Professor of Organic Chemistry at the University of Cadiz, (Spain) since 2000 and Head of the Institute of Biomolecules (INBIO) since 2014. He has been honored with the 1999 Rhône-Poulenc Rorer Award, Amsterdam, The Netherlands, from the Phytochemical Society of Europe (PSE), 2011 Molish Award, Guangzhou, China, from the International Allelopathy Society (IAS) and a Gold Medal, in Recognition of Research Excellence, Dedication, and Humanity, The European 2001 Forum, February 2015. His general philosophy is to learn from Nature. His research interests are related to different aspects of allelopathy dealing with higher plants and microorganisms, involving studies on natural and modified ecosystems, and developing new methodologies for allelopathic studies including mode of action. He heads the "Cadiz Allelopathy Group" a pioneering team in Europe in allelopathic studies from the organic chemistry perspective that has a multidisciplinary structure. Over the years, his group has isolated, identified, characterized, synthesized, and tested the bioactivity of more than 2600 potential allelochemicals and derivatives belonging to a wide range of chemical families including aglycons and/or glycosides (simple phenolics, coumarins, flavonoids, lignans, mono-, sesqui-, di-, spirodi-, mero-, and triterpenoids, steroids, benzoxazinoids among others) to permit their corresponding SAR studies. He has been named as a co-inventor of 12 international patents. His publications exceed 300, inclusive of book chapters. He has co-edited two books on "Recent Advances in Allelopathy" and has supervised 31 doctoral theses, and delivered more than 370 lectures around the world. Alexandra García Durán - after earning her Bachelor's degree in Chemistry, she received her Ph.D. degree in Sciences from University of Cadiz. During this period, she has specialized in isolation and synthesis to modify the physico-chemical properties of natural products in order to obtain enhanced biological activities. Furthermore, she was an international visiting scientist at Charles Sturt University in Wagga Wagga (Australia) and a postdoctoral fellow at Università degli Studi della Campania "Luigi Vanvitelli" (Caserta, Italy), which introduced her to the isolation and purification of natural products in NMR-based metabolomics studies. Currently, her main research interests are related to bioactivity, modes of action, mass spectrometry, and NMR spectroscopy. José M. G. Molinillo obtained a Ph.D. degree from the University of Cadiz. He visited the University of Tübingen, to learn new techniques for incorporation into his new research field, allelopathy. One of the main aspects he studied has been the search for new herbicides based on natural product lead compounds. He has investigated different plant species, among which sunflower is noteworthy, from which he isolated numerous sesquiterpene lactones and two new families of natural products, heliannuoles and helispiranes. Another highlight of his work is the study of benzohydroxamic acids and their degradation compounds, which occur in plants of the family Poaceae, such as wheat, corn, and barley. He has published 124 articles and 14 book chapters, and edited two books. His publications cover the organic chemistry of natural products and the search for new herbicides.

Chapter 1Introduction.- Chapter 2 Exudation.- Chapter 3Leaching.- Chapter 4 Volatilization.- Chapter 5 Decomposition.- Chapter 6 Applications.- Chapter7 Future Studies.- Acknowledgments.- References.