Since very ancient times, humans have used plants to treat infectious diseases; scientific
investigations of plant material have clearly proved the therapeutic efficacy of plants over time.
Today, many countries use plants to treat different maladies including infectious diseases of the
respiratory, gastrointestinal, urinary and biliary systems (Rios and Recio, 2005). Although
significant progress has been made in microbiological research and in the control of many
diseases caused by infectious organisms such as bacteria, recurrent epidemics due to drugresistant
bacteria as well as the appearance of new bacterial pathogenic strains demand the
discovery of new antibiotics. The investigation of medicinal plants using frontier technologies is
now being reconsidered to be a feasible approach for discovering novel bioactive agents to solve
widespread public health problems