Psoralea corylifolia


Psoralea corylifolia is a plant used in Indian and Chinese traditional medicine. The seeds of this plant contain a variety of coumarins, including psoralen.

Etymology

Psoralea is from the Greek psoraleos meaning 'scabby', and refers to small glands covering the plant. Corylifolia comes from similarity of the leaves to those of Corylus, a genus of tree in northern world regions, such as Sweden.

Description

Psoralea corylifolia grows 50–90 cm tall and is an annual plant. It has pale-purple flowers in short, condensed, axillary spikes. Its corolla is pale purple. Flowers one-seeded fruits. The most distinctive feature is the occurrence of minute brown glands which are immersed in surface tissue on all parts of the plant, giving it a distinctive and pleasant fragrance.

Habitat and distribution

P. corylifolia is native to India and Sri Lanka, and was occasionally cultivated in Arabia for its supposed medicinal properties.

Chemical constituents

P. corylifolia extract contains numerous phytochemicals, including flavonoids, coumarins, meroterpenes.

Use in traditional medicine

P. corylifolia L., or bu gu zhi in traditional Chinese medicine, is an herb used as a supposed therapy for several disorders having limited clinical evidence, such as treatment of lichen-induced dermatitis by psoralen extract combined with sunlight exposure.