In 1897, Friedrich Wilhelm Zopf named the chemical he originally isolated from the African species Stereocaulon salazinum as salazinic acid.

[2] In 1933, Yasuhiko Asahina and J. Asano studied salazinic acid they had isolated from Parmelia cetrata, and found a unique ring system with seven members containing two phenolic components.

[3] Japanese chemists demonstrated in the late 1960s that the isolated mycobiont of the lichen Ramalina crassa could produce salazinic acid when grown in laboratory culture.

[11][12] Recent (2021) research indicates that salazinic acid is a potent modulator of Nrf2, NF-κB and STAT3 signaling pathways in colorectal cancer cells.

[16][17] In nature, salazinic acid serves as an antioxidant as well as a photoprotectant, helping the lichen to survive in conditions of both abiotic and biotic stress.

[23] Several authors have explicitly named salazinic acid in the specific epithets of their published lichen species, thereby acknowledging the presence of this compound as an important taxonomic characteristic.