Michelia Champaca Linn., belonging to family Magnoliaceae, is commonly known as Champa. It is a medium size evergreen tree highly distributed in eastern Sub-Himalayan tract, West Bengal, Myanmar, and South India in addition to China. This plant is useful either as an ornamental purpose or as traditional ethnomedicine. Now, the purpose of this article is to describe the pharmacognostic, pharmacological and chromatographic profile of this plant. This article provides the collective information about the phytochemical constituents isolated from various parts of this plant used in a modern scenario for the treatment of various ailments like β-sitosterol, sesquiterpenes, parthenolide, dihydro parthenolide, gallic acid, quercetin, liriodenine, essential oils, starch, etc. Traditional uses of the plant in the treatment of various disease like rheumatism, gout, diuretic, febrifuge, etc. This article also gives information about reported pharmacological activities such as anti-diabetic, anti-microbial, anti-inflammatory, diuretic, anti-ulcer, analgesic, burn wound healing, antihelmintholytic, Procognitive activity, anti-oxidant and some other activities.
INTRODUCTION:M. champaca Linn. belonging to the family (Magnoliaceae) is an evergreen plant mainly cultivated in Indian gardens and near temples for its fragrant flowers and handsome foliage 1 . In the traditional system of medicines, plants are the primary source for the treatment of various ailments. Michelia is the genus consisting of 80 species distributed throughout the tropical and subtropical region and of which about 70 species are native to China and found in southwestern and eastern mountainous region 2 . One of these 80 species, M. champaca which is commonly known as Champa in Hindi; Champaka in Bengali; Atigandhaka in Sanskrit 3 .