Bunga Telang

Bunga Telang
Scientific Name	Clitoria ternatea
Family	Fabaceae
Order	Fabales
Synonym	Clitoris principissae

{slider= Origin & Distribution}

Originated in Tropical Asia. Widely distributed to many tropical and sub tropical countries South and Central America, East and West Indies, China and India.

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{slider=Plant Material of Interest}

Flowers use to give a blue tinge to rice. Leaves are use to dye food or eaten as a pot herb. The young pods may be consumed like string beans.

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{slider=Plan Description}

Perennial herbaceous plant, with elliptic, obtuse leaves.

Growing well in moist and neutral soil.

The plants are 90-162 cm tall.

Flowers are blue scabbards linear and flat 6-12 cm long.

Fruits are 5-7 cm long, flat pods with 6-10 seeds in each pod, edible when tender.

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{slider=Chemical Composition}

Total plant  protein ranges from 14-20 %. Crude protein and fibre in the leaves 21.5% and 21.5-29 % respectively. The seed is very high in protein  15-25 %. Seed contains 25-38 %, 5 % total sugar and 10 % oil. Nitrogen concentration of whole 1.7-4 % and amino acid composition as percentage of crude protein in seed.

The petroleum ether (60-80°C) flower extracts reveals the presence of Taraxerol, a pentacyclic triterpenoid (Shyamkumar & Bhat Ishwar 2012). Flowers contain of steroids, triterpenoid, saponins, resins, tannins and starch in petroleum ether (60-80°C).

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{slider=Traditional Uses}

Traditional Indian medicine use as a brain tonic and is believed to promote memory and inteligence .

The juice of flowers is applied to cure insect bites and skin diseases, the paste of the flowers is applied to cure infections of eye, and entire plant is used as antidote for snake bites (Nadkarni K.M., 1954)

The plants are used in Ayurveda. The roots are most widely used and are bitter, refrigerant, laxative, intellect promoting, diuretic, antihelmintic and tonic and are useful in dementia, hemicrania, burning sensation, leprosy, inflammation, leucoderma, bronchitis, asthma, pulmonary tuberculosis, ascites and fever. The seeds are cathartic, while the leaves are used in otalgia and hepatopathy

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{slider=Medicinal Value}

Anti inflammatory

The petroleum ether (60-80°C) flower extract poses significant anti inflammatory properties at both the dose levels (200 and 400 mg/kg body weight) (Shyamkumar & Bhat Ishwar, 2012).

Analgesic Cctivity

Analgesic activity was exhibited of the petroleum ether (60-80°C) flower extracts  at dose level of 400mg/kg body weight.

Acetyl Choline

The study conducted on rats revealed that C. ternatea root extracts increase rat brain acetyl choline content and acetyl choline estrase activity in a similar fashion to the standard cerebro drug pyritinol (Taranalli & Cheeramkuzhy, 2000).

Antihyperlipidemic

Oral administration of the hydroalcoholic extract of the roots and seeds of C. ternatea and the hydroalcoholic extract of the seeds of V. mungo resulted in a significant (p < 0.05) reduction of serum total cholesterol, triglycerides, very low-density lipoprotein cholesterol, and low-density lipoprotein cholesterol levels. The atherogenic index and the HDL/LDL ratio were also normalized after treatment in diet-induced hyperlipidemic rats. The effects were compared with atorvastatin (50 mg/kg, p.o.) and gemfibrozil (50 mg/kg, p.o.), reference standards (Solanki YB & SM Jain, 2010).

Anti asthmatic

The results of present investigation showed that the LD₅₀ of ECTR is more than 1300 mg/kg.

Ethanol extract  of Clitoria ternatea roots significantly decreases milk induced leucocytosis and eosinophilia, protects egg albumin induced degranulations of mast cells in mice and inhibits area of blue dye leakage in passive cutaneous anaphylaxis

in rats at (100–150 mg/kg, i.p.). Phytochemical studies observed the presence of steroids, saponin, flavonoids, and glycosides. The results showed antiasthmatic activity of the extracts (Taur D.J. & R.Y. Patil 2011). 

Others

In animal studies the methanolic extract of C. ternatea demonstrated nootropic, anxiolyticm antidepressant, anticonvulsant and antistress activities. The active constituents include tannins, resins, starch, taraxerol and taraxerone (Jain N.,  2003).

Biologically active peptides called cliotides have been isolated from the heat-stable fraction of C. ternatea extract. Cliotides belong to the Cyclotides family and activities studies show that cyciotides display potent antimicrobial activity against E.coli, K. pneumonia, P. aeruginosa and activity against Hela cells.

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{slider=Toxicity Studies}

The petroleum ether (60-80°C) flower extracts is found to be safe even at the dose of 2000 mg/kg body weight by acute toxicity studies (Shyamkumar & Bhat Ishwar, 2012).

 An ethanolic extracts of aerial parts and root of C.t  when administered

orally to mice, in doses 1500 mg/kg and above they were found to be lethargic (Taranalli & Cheeramkuczhi, 2000). Though CT root extracts, up to 3000 mg/kg administered orally failed to produce any lethality in mice, animals showed signs of central nervous system depression indicated by ptosis (dropping of upper

eyelids), and decreased locomotor activity at doses 1500 mg/kg and above. A characteristic observation was the cathartic effect indicated by profuse watery stools in all the root extract treated mice. All mice which received the extracts in the dose 2900mg/kg and above through the intraperitoneal route died in 6 h, due to severe

CNS depression. Kulkarni et al. (1988) studied the gross behavioral and acute toxicity after administration of graded doses of alcoholic extract of C.t aerial parts. Post drug observations were made at intervals 30 min, 3 and 6 h. The LD₅₀ was determined approximately 30 min to 1 h after drug administration. Dose-dependent inhibition of alertness, diminution of spontaneous motor activity and increased sedation were produced by the extract in a dose range of 1–2 g/kg. At 2 g/kg, responses to acoustic, tactile and nociceptive stumuli were reduced and loss of righting reflex was observed in some mice. No catalepsy was observed even at the highest dose of extract used, while chlorpromazine 10 mg/kg, exhibited marked

reflex and moderate catalepsy. LD₅₀ of the extract in mice was 2290 mg/kg, ip. Acute toxicity relating to the determination of LD₅₀ value was performed with different doses of themethanolic extract of CT root and observed that the extract is safe to use in mice even at the dose of 3.2 g/kg orally (Parimaladevi et al., 2004). There are

various doses on  which this plant has been studied, which prove this plant should be studied more systematically for its toxicity in long-term effect.

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{slider=Reference}

Kalamani, A and S Michael Gomez 2003 Exploitation of new ornamental type in clitoria (Clitoria spp) Int J. Mendel. 20: 41-42.

Gomez S.M and A. Kalamani 2003). Butterfly Pea (Clitoria ternatea): A Nutritive Multipurpose Forage Legume for the Tropics- An Overview. Pakistan Jounal of Nutrition 2 (6): 374-379.

http://en.wikipedia

Jain, N., C.C. Ohal, S.K. Shroff,R.H. Bhutada, R.S. Somani, V.S. Kasture, S.B. Kasture (2003). Clitoria ternatea and CNS’ Pharmacology Biochemistry and Behavior 75 (3): 529.

Nadkarni K.M 1954 in Shyamkumar & Bhat Ishwar (2012).

Nguyen, Kien Truc Giang, Zhang, S.; Nguyen, N.T.; Nguyen, P.Q., Chiu, M.S., Hardjojo, A.; Tam,J.P. (2011). Discovery and Characterization of Novel Cyclotides Originated from Chimeric Precursors Consisting of Albumin-1 Chain a and Cyclotide Domains in the  Fabaceae Family. Journal of Biological Chemistry 286 (27): 24275-24287.

Shyamkumar & Bhat Ishwar (2012) Anti inflammatory, analgesic and phytochemical Studies of Clitoria ternatea Linn Flower Extract. International Research Journal of Pharmacy; 3(3), Pg 208-210. www.irjponline.com 

Solanki YB, Jain SM. Antihyperlipidemic activity of Clitoria ternatea and Vigna mungo in rats. Pharm Biol. (2010).

Taur D.J. & R.Y. Patil (2011). Evaluation of antiasthmatic activity of Clitoria ternatea L. roots. Journal of Ethnopharmacology 136, Pg 374-376. 

Taranalli, A.D. and T.C. Cheeramkuzhy, 2000. Influence of Clitroia ternatea extracts on memory and cerebro cholinergic activity in rats. Pharmaceutical Biology, 38(1): 51-56.

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