Disclaimer : This databank is curated from literature and may not claim for any medications or directly use of plants without any prior knowledge or consultation of physician.



Botanical Name Plant's Common Name Plant Family

MH014 : Portulaca oleracea L.

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Melghat's Flora's Serial No. : 24  
Class : Magnoliopsida - Dicotyledons
Order : Caryophyllales
Family : Portulacaceae - Purslane family
Genus : Portulaca L. - purslane
Species : Portulaca oleracea L. - little hogweed
Plant Location in Melghat : In stream and river bets  
Plant Category : Herbs  
Plant's Current Status :  
Plant Family : Portulacaceae  

 
Plant Common Name : Ghol, purslane, verdolaga, little hogweed, red root, pursley, horse tooth amaranth
 
Synonym : Portulaca aurea Hort. ex DC.
Portulaca consanguinea Schlecht
Portulaca laevis Buch-Ham.
Portulaca officinarum Crantz
Portulaca olitoria Pall.
Portulaca parviflora Haw.
Portulaca suffruticosa Thw.
Portulaca viridis Hort. ex DC.


Description : Annual or perennial, prostrate or erect, c. 25 cm tall, succulent, glabrous, green or purplish green herb. Branches and stem with 3-20 mm rarely up to 50 mm long internodes. Leaves alternate or subopposite, closely crowded below the flowers, spathulate or obovate-oblong to linear-oblong, attenuate at the base, sub-sessile, obtuse or truncate, 3-25 mm long, 1.5-8 mm broad, thick, fleshy, glabrous, glistening white below, green or purplish-green above; stipular appendages usually absent, or rarely every minute and setaceous. Inflorescence usually in the forks of branches, cymose, with clusters of 3-6 flowers subtended by 4-leaved involucre, rarely flowers solitary and terminal. Flowers sessile, yellow, 5-8 mm across, bracteate; bracts membranous, ovate, c. 3 mm long, acuminate, white or somewhat purplish. Sepals subequal, basally united into a short, 2-3 mm long tube, keeled; lobes 2-3 mm long, slightly hooded, margin broad membranous, acute, deciduous. Petals 5, deliquescent, slightly united at the base, obovate, 5-6 mm long, 2.5-3 mm wide, yellow, emarginate with mucronulate notch. Stamens 7-12, basally somewhat united and adnate to petals, filaments c. 2.5 mm long, sensitive to touch, anthers ovoid. Ovary c. 2 mm long, half embedded in calyx tube, ovoid; style 1.5-2 mm long, stigmas 4-5, sticky, c. 1 mm long. Capsule many-seeded, 6-8 mm long, 3-4 mm in diam. Seeds shining black, c. 0.5-0.8 mm, reniform, testa tuberculate. Fl. Per. Flowers open in morning throughout the year.
 
Curated Medicinal Use / Activity : Its leaves are used for insect or snake bites on the skin, boils, sores, pain from bee stings, bacillary dysentery, Diarrhea, hemorrhoids, postpartum bleeding, and intestinal bleeding. Anti-cancer (Li et al., 2012)
 
Plant's Phytochemicals : Noradrenaline
Calcium salts
Dopamine
L-DOPA
Malic acid
Citric acid
Glutamic acid
Asparagic acid
Nicotinic acid
Alanine
Glucose
Fructose
Sucrose
Betacyanins
Omega-3 Fatty Acid
2'-hydroxy- 5,7-dimethoxy-3-benzyl-chroman-4-one
2'-hydroxy-5,6,7-trimethoxy-3-benzyl-chroman-4-one
5,2'-dihydroxy-6,7-dimethoxy-3-benzyl-chroman-4-one
5,2'-dihydroxy-7-methoxy-3-benzylidene-chroman-4-one Kaempferol
Myricetin
Luteolin
Apigenin
Quercetin
Genistein
Genistin
Portulacanones B
Portulacanones C
Portulacanones D
Oleraceins A, Oleraceins B, Oleraceins C, Oleraceins D, and Oleraceins E
Portulosides A and Portulosides B
Beta-carotene
Glutathione
Melatonin
Portulacerebroside A
Catechol
Bergapten

Reference : ~ Dhore MA and Joshi PA; "Flora of Melghat Tiger Reserve"; Directorate, Project Tiger, Melghat (1988); PMID :

~ Das, DC.; Sinha, NK.; Chattopadhyay JC.; Das M. and Samanta P.; "The use of medicinal plants for the treatment of Gonorrhea and Syphilis in south west Bengal of India"; International Journal of Phytomedicine (2013); 5: 14-17 PMID :