Indigenous use and bio-efficacy of medicinal plants in the Rasuwa District, Central Nepal

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>By revealing historical and present plant use, ethnobotany contributes to drug discovery and socioeconomic development. Nepal is a natural storehouse of medicinal plants. Although several ethnobotanical studies were conducted in the country, many areas remain unexplored. Furthermore, few studies have compared indigenous plant use with reported phytochemical and pharmacological properties.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>Ethnopharmacological data was collected in the Rasuwa district of Central Nepal by conducting interviews and focus group discussions with local people. The informant consensus factor (F_IC) was calculated in order to estimate use variability of medicinal plants. Bio-efficacy was assessed by comparing indigenous plant use with phytochemical and pharmacological properties determined from a review of the available literature. Criteria were used to identify high priority medicinal plant species.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>A total of 60 medicinal formulations from 56 plant species were documented. Medicinal plants were used to treat various diseases and disorders, with the highest number of species being used for gastro-intestinal problems, followed by fever and headache. Herbs were the primary source of medicinal plants (57% of the species), followed by trees (23%). The average F_IC value for all ailment categories was 0.82, indicating a high level of informant agreement compared to similar studies conducted elsewhere. High F_ICvalues were obtained for ophthalmological problems, tooth ache, kidney problems, and menstrual disorders, indicating that the species traditionally used to treat these ailments are worth searching for bioactive compounds: <it>Astilbe rivularis</it>, <it>Berberis asiatica</it>, <it>Hippophae salicifolia, Juniperus recurva</it>, and <it>Swertia multicaulis</it>. A 90% correspondence was found between local plant use and reported plant chemical composition and pharmacological properties for the 30 species for which information was available. Sixteen medicinal plants were ranked as priority species, 13 of which having also been prioritized in a country-wide governmental classification.</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p>The <it>Tamang </it>people possess rich ethnopharmacological knowledge. This study allowed to identify many high value and high priority medicinal plant species, indicating high potential for economic development through sustainable collection and trade.</p

Micropropagation of wild species of the genus Asparagus L. and their interspecific hybrids with cultivated A. officinalis L., and verification of genetic stability using EST-SSRs

An efficient micropropagation method forasparagus species was developed in this study. The methodallows the fast cloning of the elite genotypes from differentasparagus species and the interspecific hybrids obtainedfrom these species. Rhizome bud explants were disinfectedusing 3 g l-1 of benomyl and 20 g l-1 of sodium hypochlorite.Then, they were cultured on Asparagus RhizomeBud Medium 3 (ARBM-3) consisting in modified Murashigeand Skoog medium with salts with EDDHA-Fe(85.7 mg l-1) instead of EDTA-Fe and vitamins, supplementedwith 0.3 mg l-1 NAA, 0.1 mg l-1 KIN, 2 mg l-1ancymidol and 6 % sucrose. Results showed that themethod developed produced high disinfection rates(70?95 %). More than 70 % of the explants developedshoots and the rooting rate on ARBM-3 medium was30?45 %. The rooting rate increased to 60?85 % when theunrooted shoots were subjected to an additional cycle ofrooting, reaching 100 % after two cycles of rooting. Themultiplication was achieved through mechanical divisionof rooted shoot clusters growing in ARBM-3. The acclimatizationrate of the micropropagated plantlets was higherthan 90 %. The micropopagated plantlets were screened forsomaclonal variation using 12 expressed sequence tagderived simple sequence repeat markers. The results confirmedthe character ??true to type?? of the plantlets, indicatingthat the method developed in this study can be usedto successfully micropropagate asparagus species.Fil: Regalado González, Jose Javier. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas; Argentina. Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas; EspañaFil: Carmona Martín, E.. Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas; EspañaFil: Castro, P.. Genetic Improvement of Fruits and Vegetables Laboratory; Estados UnidosFil: Moreno, R.. Universidad de Córdoba; EspañaFil: Gil, J.. Universidad de Córdoba; EspañaFil: Encina, C. L.. Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas; Españ