Medicinal plants cultivation ensures risk-free status

Medicinal plants: Cultivation ensures risk-free living and protects the environment

07/17/2013

The great confidence of the population in the efficacy and good tolerability of herbal medicines has led to a steadily growing demand for medicinal plants. The wildlife of some species is therefore considered endangered. In order to protect the environment and still ensure a consistent quality of raw materials, therefore, medicinal plants are cultivated with the help of science.

The selection and cultivation of medicinal plants is also useful for other reasons, explained Prof. Dr. med. Maximilian Weigend, Director of the Botanical Gardens of the University of Bonn recently in Munich: „The cultivation and controlled cultivation of active-ingredient-rich species produces natural products that can be harvested in high pharmaceutical quality and in sufficient quantity.“ The advantages of such a successful domestication demonstrated the researchers using the example of comfrey and Bärentraube.

The naturally wild legwort species (Symphytum officinale) contain in their roots in addition to the ingredients allantoin and rosmarinic acid, which have an analgesic and anti-inflammatory effect on blunt injuries, also called pyrrolizidine alkaloids (PA). But they are liver damage in higher doses. The task of the research was therefore to develop a comfrey variety, which contains a high content of curative substances, but no PA.

The result was the high-performance variety Symphytum x uplandicum, a patented comfrey that does not process the roots but the aerial parts into medicines. The produced from this variety Beinwellsalbe offers good efficacy because of the optimal amount of active ingredients and a high level of safety, since hardly PA are included.

From this positive experience, Prof. Weigend then made the bearberry (Arctostaphylos uva-ursi), which is used against cystitis, the subject of his research. The choice is very much on this medicinal plant, „As here often inferior material comes on the market“, so the scientist. Particularly problematic are Chinese imports. The scientific task was to identify a cultivar rich in arbutin as much as possible. In a two-year trial, wild plants were collected, analyzed and cultured at 18 sites. The registration of a variety for a patent is now, so the botanist, nothing in the way. (KFN)

Picture credits: fotolia © Maikaefer