Biochemical Analysis of Allelopathic Compounds: Plants, Microorganisms, and Soil Secondary Metabolites

This chapter concerns the biochemical analysis of secondary metabolites found in plants, micro-organisms and in soil. Allelopathic scientists need to be aware of a number of metabolic changes in plants, and to a certain extent microorganisms, when they are planning to conduct research. The recent advances in natural products chemistry have been made through the use of traditional and modern methods of extraction, isolation, purification, and identification of secondary metabolites. The secondary plant metabolites may influence the growth of associated plant species or even own growth. Some such compounds may be induced in plants by microorganisms, insects, or higher grazers that affect the plant's development. It is important to recognize the synergistic properties of components of essential oils that are of different types and classes of compounds. Supercritical fluid chromatography coupled with liquid chromatography may be used for the analysis for thermally labile or nonvolatile compounds, which represent about 60 to 70 percent of the natural products present.