Chromatographic separation and estimation of natural antimalarial flavonoids in biological matrices

Malaria is a major life-threatening tropical disease affecting about half of the world’s population. Due to the increasing resistance of Plasmodium falciparum against the marketed drugs, the non-endemic areas of malaria are also at risk which demands for continuous and a compelling need to investigate the bioactive natural products for their pharmacological activity against malaria parasite and undoubtedly satisfactory outcomes are being observed with less adverse events in such endeavours. Flavonoids have emerged as the most important bio-therapeutic class possessing anti-malarial activity. Flavonoids have also been reported to reverse anti-malarial drug resistance, thus exerting dual therapeutic benefit. The pharmacological outcome of these bioactive constituents essentially depends on their circulating levels reaching the target site of action thus, necessitating the quantification in bio-matrices which is required for personalized therapy. Furthermore, the estimation of drug level in biological system is crucial for therapeutic drug monitoring. The development and validation of high-throughput bio-analytical methods for estimation of phytochemicals in biological fluids is a preliminary requirement for establishing such PK–PD relationship. The present review intends to shed an insightful focus on the available bio-analytical methods for assessment of natural anti-malarial flavonoids which will be of immense help in their further exploration.