Medicinal Value of Euphorbia Tirucalli

Abstract

Nishi Gupta, Garima Vishnoi, Ankita Wal, Pranay Wal

Natural products play an important role in drug discovery and many approved therapeutics as well as drug candidates have been derived from natural sources. They have been the source of most of the active ingredients of medicines. The beneficial medicinal effects of plant materials typically result from the combinations of secondary products present in the plan. These secondary metabolites constitute the medicinal value of a drug plant, which produces a definite physiological action on human body. The plant of Euphorbia tirucalli belongs to the family Euphorbiaceae, which is commonly known as Barki-thohar. This plant is native of America but has become acclimatized and grows freely in all parts of India. This is a common medicinal plant of India; the plant’s milky juice and stem bark are used. Milky juice in small doses is a purgative but in large doses it is acrid, counter-irritant, and emetic. E. tirucalli latex seems to reduce the specific cellular immunity associated with the virus Epstein-Barr injection by activating the virus lytic cycle. The bark/latex of E. tirucalli presents pharmacological activities as anantibacterial, molluscicide, antiherpetic, and antimutagenic. It also shows cocarcinogenic and anticarcinogenic activities. In the northeast of region in Brazil, the latex of E. tirucalli is used as a folk medicine against syphilis. As an antimicrobial; a laxative agent to control intestinal parasites to treat asthma, cough, earache, rheumatism, verrucae, cancer, epithelioma, sarcoma, and skin tumors. E. tirucalli contains a large quantity of terpenes and sterols among its constituent and the following substances, which have been isolated; alcohol eufol, alfaeuforbol, and taraxa sterol e tirucallol (Imai, 1994; This review highlights on the existing information particularly on the phytochemistry and various pharmacological properties of E. tirucalli, which may provide incentive for proper evaluation of the plant as a medicinal agent.