Expert: Dana Krempels, Ph.D. - 6/13/2011

Question
First of all excuse my poor English. It's not my native language.

From an evolution point of view, how can you explain medicinal  plants ?

Answer
Dear Nerd972,

Medicinal plants don't make the compounds we find useful for *our* benefit.  Most such compounds serve an important function in the plant, such as helping it avoid being invaded by bacteria or fungi, or even deterring herbivores.

Some of the compounds produced by plants happen to have bioactivity in human (and other animal) bodies, possibly because of convergence of plasma membrane receptors or other cellular structures, and sometimes possibly even because of extremely distant common ancestry, or lateral gene transfer.  Very difficult to know exactly why.  But the happy side result is that we are often able to discover plant compounds that have an affinity for our own cellular receptors, and we can then chemically modify them to be even more precisely targeted to help cure our ills.

Hope that helps.

Dana