Study on medicinal uses of Persicaria and Rumex species of polygonaceae family

Abstract

Plants contain bioactive molecules and thus can provide lead structures for the development of alternative medicines to available toxic commercial drugs with better effectivity and increased safety. Flowering plants have always been a great source of biologically active compounds. Although a very small portion has been investigated, it has been found that only 9 species of of flowering plants contain about 120 therapeutic lead molecules. Some of the useful plant drugs include Vinblastine, vincristine, taxol, podophyllotoxin, camptothecin, digitoxigenin, gitoxigenin, digoxigenin, tubocurarine, morphine, codeine, aspirin, atropine, pilocarpine, capscicine, allicin, curcumin, artemesinin and ephedrine are some of the important drug molecules that can be found from traditional medicinal plants. For this purpose, two important flowering species named Persicaria and Rumex from Polygonaceae family has been studied in this review paper to discover the potential therapeutical applications of them. It has been found that both of the species have various important medicinal uses and have been used for many years in different parts of the world.