1. LON-CAPA Logo
  2. Help
  3. Log In
 


Welcome to an overview of what Economic Botany has to offer.

It will be a distance learning course this spring 2000, so below are highlights of what I plan

to be doing in the TopClass format

 

LECTURE 12 HIGHLIGHTS FOR BIOLOGY 03074, ECONOMIC BOTANY:

MEDICINAL AND PSYCHOACTIVE PLANTS

Text for both editions: Chs. 19 and 20

possible web site: http://www.ars-grin.gov/duke/syllabus/

(short course in medicinal botany from Dr. Jim Duke, a big name in the field)

 

FOXGLOVE: DIGITALIS PURPUREA

Scrophulariaceae: the snapdragon or figwort family. Zygomorphic flowers, with fused petals and a staminode (sterile stamen).

Foxglove is a well-known ornamental flower that readily grows in most temperate climates. Leaves are the source of digitalis. Historically, William Withering (1780s) was an English MD who studied local herb remedies and recognized foxglove leaf as the active ingredient for the treatment of dropsy (fluid accumulation from congestive heart failure). Digitalis: a cardiac glycoside that strengthens cardiac contraction.

 

OPIUM POPPY: PAPAVER SOMNIFERUM

Papaveraceae: the poppy family. Se-2, that fall off before flower opens; Pe-4 to 12; St-many; Ca-2, fused, superior. Flowers solitary, fruit a capsule. Mostly temperate herbs with dissected leaves that have a milky sap and produce drugs. Sanguinaria, bloodroot; Papaver, poppy (ornamental and opium).

The opium poppy is a self-seeding, sun-loving annual that over here is used as the source for poppy seeds. In contrast, harvesting for opium entails slashing a fertilized capsule and collecting the alkaloid-containing latex. The prime opium growing regions are in Southeast Asia. The sleep-inducing, pain-relieving, worry-allaying, and addiction-inducing properties of opium have been known since Sumerian times.

opium and opiates: these are drugs that act on specific receptors in the CNS (central nervous system) to reduce pain perception. Morphine and other opiates cause many effects: pain awareness reduction, cough suppression (codeine), pupil constriction, respiratory depression, decrease in GI tract motility (so constipating), urinary retention.

 

COCA: ERYTHROXYLUM COCA

The coca plant (Erythroxylaceae), native to the Andes, is a shrub with evergreen leaves that can be harvested 2-3 ´ year. Coca chewing was widespread among the Incas, where the leaves were chewed with lime to release the cocaine in the leaves. By 1860, the substance cocaine was extracted from leaves and became quite popular: think of Sigmund Freud, Sherlock Holmes, Coca-Cola . 1970s-1980s resurgence of popularity, but dangers made aware (Len Bias).

cocaine: medicinally, an ester local anesthetic that blocks nerve conduction. Also, cocaine is a potent constrictor of local blood vessels and so is useful to shrink mucous membranes for ENT surgery. Psychoactively, cocaine is a powerful CNS stimulant that inhibits dopamine reuptake, prolonging a sense of well-being.

 

ERGOT: CLAVICEPS PURPUREA

Ergot is a fungus that grows on rye (Secale cereale) during cool wet summers, producing hard, purplish ergots or sclerotia on the heads of the rye. Horrifying consequence of a few sclerotia milled into rye bread:"St. Anthony's fire," since burning sensation on hands and feet before dry gangrene setting in. Pregnant women would abort. Others would show CNS symptoms. All of these symptoms are explainable by the presence of the alkaloids in the ergot. Historical evidence indicates that frequent ergot outbreaks lead to population depression in Europe until introduction of alternative food sources, e.g., potato.

ergot alkaloids: lysergic acid backbone in combination with different groups, so that either LSD (lysergic acid diethylamide) or ergotamine (and related substances).

 

TOBACCO: NICOTIANA TABACUM

Solanaceae: the nightshade family. 5 fused petals, fruit a berry or capsule.

Tobacco is a native New World plant that is grown for its leaves. The leaves are dried and cured. Tobacco had frequent medicinal and ritualistic use among Native Americans, and when introduced to Europe in 1550s, it became quite popular there. To shore up supplies, American colonies grew a lot of tobacco. Tobacco is now recognized as an addictive substance and the number one preventable cause of cancer in USA.

nicotine: a volatile liquid alkaloid. Nicotine is a central nervous system stimulant that is the active ingredient in tobacco smoke and an effective insecticide (at proportionately higher doses).

    


|main page| |background| |03028: Physiology| |03048: Anatomy|

|03050: Invertebrate Zoology| |03051: Vertebrate Zoology| |03074: Economic Botany|

 


Please send comments and questions to: cronewil@hvcc.edu

 

HVCC home page

Copyright 1999 by Wilson Crone

External and unofficial links are not endorsed by Hudson Valley Community College

 

This page updated on October 4, 1999