totarol

thumb|New Zealand scientist Sir Thomas Hill Easterfield was the first person to discover totarol. Photo 1920. thumb|Totarol powder Totarol is a naturally produced diterpene that is bioactive. It was first isolated by McDowell and Easterfield from the heartwood of Podocarpus totara, an endemic conifer species found in New Zealand. Podocarpus totara was investigated for unique molecules due to the tree's increased resistance to rotting. Recent studies have confirmed totarol's unique antimicrobial and therapeutic properties. Consequently, totarol is a candidate for a new source of drugs and has been the goal of numerous syntheses.

== Discovery == Totarol was discovered in 1910 by New Zealand scientist Sir Thomas Hill Easterfield. While investigating the properties of Miro, Kahikatea, Rimu, Matai and Totara, Easterfield detected a "crystalline bloom" on totara boards a few hours after leaving the planing machine. After extraction of totarol from Podocarpus totara, Easterfield observed no other compound had been cited in chemical literature before with this formula. Easterfield and his colleague J.C McDowell proposed the name "totarol" in a follow-up paper in 1915, as the crystalline substance was believed to possess a tertiary alcohol group. In 1937 Short and Stromberg continued investigations, publishing Totarol Part 1. In 1951 Short and Wang became the first to identify the chemical structure of totarol with their paper Totarol Part 2.