ABSTRACT
The growing interest of developed countries in phytotherapy is a propitious event for stimulating the search for medicinal plants. Cerrado, a hotspot within Brazilian biodiversity, is a promising source of bioactive chemicals and has been actively exploited for targeting neurodegenerative diseases in the development of new phytochemicals with unknown chemical, pharmacological, and therapeutic aspects. From the phytochemical point of view, plants of the Annonaceae family have been increasingly researched, due to the presence of new classes of bioactive natural substances. Studies of extracts from different parts of species from this family have led to the isolation of benzyl tetrahydroisoquinolinic, protoberberinic, proaporfinic and 2-aza-anthraquinones alkaloids, as well as flavonoids, terpenoids, saponins, tannins, and others.
