Ethnobotanical Characteristics

Description

Erect leafy, grayish, annual herb, up to 80 cm high, covered with mealy white hairs, stem ribbed, with few side branches. Leaves alternating, broadly ovate to diamond-shaped, dentate, scarcely mealy. Inflorescence short axillary and terminal paniculate spikes, flowers inconspicuous, petals absent, perianth 5-lobed, greenish, mealy, fleshy; stamens 5, pistil single with 2 stigmas. Fruit a single-seeded utricle; seeds black nutlets, keeled and pitted.

Habitat & Distribution

Widespread all over the world in wet habitats. In U.A.E the plant is a fairly common weed of damp urban habitats, plantations, gardens, roadsides, fallow fields and oases throughout the country; less in mountains.

Part(s) used

Whole plant, oil of flowering tips and fruits

Traditional & Medicinal Uses

Plant is nutritive, diuretic, mild purgative, emollient, anthelmintic, tranquilizer, tonic for liver, leaves are edible. In UAE, leaves used as salad green. In India: Plant is sweet and acrid, digestive, carminative, aphrodisiac, anthelmintic, tonic, laxative and in India it is used in vitiated conditions of pita, peptic ulcer, dyspepsia, flatulence, seminal weakness, hemorrhoids, cardiac disorder, ophthalmopathy, spleenopathy, pharyngopathy and general debility.

Pharmacognosy and Phytochemistry

Parts studied 

Leaves

Microscopic Description

The epidermal cells are covered with thin unstriated cuticle. They are irregular in shape with markedly wavy cell walls which are more observed in the lower epidermis. The oval anomocytic stomata are abundant on both epidermises. Uniseriate conical covering trichomes normally composed of three to four cells together with short glandular trichomes are few in numbers and are observed notably at the lower epidermis. The leaf is unilateral having two layers of palisade tissues beneath the upper epidermis. Some of the palisade cells have characteristic structures with the upper portion of the cell, oval in shape and larger than the lower portion with the wavy cell walls. The spongy mesophyll cells are ellipsoid to circular in outline and they are significantly loosely held together. The spongy walls also contain large cluster crystals of calcium oxalate and some crystals merge to form larger ones. Both palisade and spongy cells have thick cell walls. The vascular strands of the spongy mesophyll are intricate and they may form loop-like structures and part of the strands take the outlines of the adjacent cell walls. The vessels are annularly and spirally thickened. The petiole and midrib have compactly arranged vascular strands that contain fibers and also annularly and spirally thickened vessels (ZCHRTM unpublished results).

• (a) TS of the leaf near the margin showing the upper and lower epidermises, palisade tissues and spongy tissues embedding vascular tissues.
• (b) Large cluster crystals of calcium oxalate in the spongy mesophyll cells of which those adjacent to the vascular tissues have particular arrangements.
• (c) Pollen grains of the flowering tops of the plant usually detected in the powder of the leaf. ( Magnifications: All x 400). 

Organoleptic characteristics

Appearance:       Solid powder
Colour:               Grayish green
Odour:               Straw-like
Taste:                 Mucilaginous

Physicochemical constants

Loss in weight on drying at 105 °C(%):                    4.80

Solubilities ( % )

Alcohol solubility:                                                    7.20
Water solubility:                                                      41.00
10% ethanolic extractive:                                       Not done

Ash values (%)

Total ash:                                                            24.60
Water soluble ash:                                             11.00
Acid-insoluble ash:                                            13.40

Successive extractive (%)

Petroleum ether (60-80):                                  1.60
Chloroform:                                                       1.90-2.10
Absolute alcohol:                                              12.00
Distilled water:                                                  31.50

pH values

pH of 1% solution:                                             5.89
pH of 10% solution:                                           5.41

The above results are under process of publication (DPS, ZCHRTM unpublished results).

Chemical constituents

Volatile oils, geraniol, methyl salicylate, saponins and triterpenoids. (Encyclopedia  Dorling Kindersley 1998; DPS, ZCHRTM, unpublished results).

Pharmacological and Toxicological studies

The pharmacological and toxicological studies carried out in our laboratory and the results in brief, on Chenopodium murale (10% ethanolic extract) have been given below. The results presented without references showed unpublished data (ZCHRTM, DBMS)

Summary of the results

Chenopodium (Aqueous extract) showed strong GIT smooth muscle (Isolated rat fundus) contraction. This plant might be useful as laxative agent.

References

• Andrews, F.W. The Flowering Plants of Anglo-Egyptian Sudan; (1950&1952) Vol. 1+II; Arbroath, Scotland.
• Chevallier, A. Encyclopedia of Medicinal plants, Dorling kindersley (London)1996: 186.
• Department of Biomedical Sciences, Zayed Complex for Herbal Research and Traditional Medicine, Unpublished results.
• Department of Pharmacognostic Sciences, Zyed Complex for Herbal Research and Traditional Medicine (ZCHRTM), unpublished results .
• Jongbloed, M.V. The Comprehensive Guide to the Wild Flowers of the united Arab Emirates, Erwda, (2003) Emirates Printing Press, Dubai, U.A.E.
• Julich, Ali NA, WD, Kusnick C, Lindequist U. (2000) Screening of Yemeni medicinal plants for antibacterial and cytotoxic activities. J Ethnopharmacol. 74(2): 173-9.
• Western, A. R. The Flora of United Arab Emirates, an introduction. (1986) Publication of the UAE University.
• كریم، فوزي .الأعشاب في دولة الإمارات العربیة المتحدة،( 1995 ) مطبعة جامعة الإمارات