Economic native plants of New Zealand

Brooker, S. G.; Cambie, R. C.; Cooper, Robert C.

doi:10.1007/bf02859329

Cited by 35 publications

(37 citation statements)

References 22 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Order By: Relevance

“…For the three regions of study ethnomedicinal uses in the local ethnopharmacopoeias were recorded for each species and information was then organized at the genus level. Data for the medicinal uses were gathered from compilations of ethnobotanical uses for New Zealand (47)(48)(49), Nepal (50,51), and the Cape of South Africa (52,53), as well as the online databases of Ng a Tipu Whakaoranga database for New Zealand (http://maoriplantuse.landcareresearch.co.nz) and the Survey of Economic Plants for Arid and Semi-Arid Lands for the Cape of South Africa (http://www.kew.org/ceb/sepasal). We selected regions for which pharmacopoeias are well known.…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Phylogenies reveal predictive power of traditional medicine in bioprospecting

Saslis‐Lagoudakis

Savolainen

Williamson

et al. 2012

Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A.

218

191

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

There is controversy about whether traditional medicine can guide drug discovery, and investment in bioprospecting informed by ethnobotanical data has fluctuated. One view is that traditionally used medicinal plants are not necessarily efficacious and there are no robust methods for distinguishing those which are most likely to be bioactive when selecting species for further testing. Here, we reconstruct a genus-level molecular phylogenetic tree representing the 20,000 species found in the floras of three disparate biodiversity hotspots: Nepal, New Zealand, and the Cape of South Africa. Borrowing phylogenetic methods from community ecology, we reveal significant clustering of the 1,500 traditionally used species, and provide a direct measure of the relatedness of the three medicinal floras. We demonstrate shared phylogenetic patterns across the floras: related plants from these regions are used to treat medical conditions in the same therapeutic areas. This finding strongly indicates independent discovery of plant efficacy, an interpretation corroborated by the presence of a significantly greater proportion of known bioactive species in these plant groups than in random samples. We conclude that phylogenetic cross-cultural comparisons can focus screening efforts on a subset of traditionally used plants that are richer in bioactive compounds, and could revitalize the use of traditional knowledge in bioprospecting.ethnobotany | ethnopharmacology | herbal medicine | phylogeny | systematics M any pharmaceutical drugs are derived from plants that were first used in traditional systems of medicine (1), and according to the World Health Organization ∼25% of medicines are plant-derived (http://www.who.int/mediacentre/factsheets/ fs134). Discoveries of novel molecules and advances in production of plant-based products (2, 3) have revived interest in natural product research. Traditional knowledge has proven a useful tool in the search for new plant-based medicines (4-8). The number of traditionally used plant species worldwide is estimated to be between 10,000 and 53,000 (9, 10); however, only a small proportion have been screened for biological activity (11,12) and the plants from some regions are less studied than others. For example, only 1% of tropical floras have been investigated (12). Moreover, there has been no systematic study to determine whether traditionally used species are significantly more likely to yield valuable bioactive compounds. This lack of data creates controversy about whether traditional medicine can guide drug discovery (1,11,(13)(14)(15), and investment in ethnobotanically led bioprospecting has fluctuated (5, 14, 15). Methods put forward for distinguishing those plants most likely to be bioactive when selecting species for further testing have been criticized, and criteria proposed to prioritize traditionally used species have not been rigorously tested (16,17). For example, use of the same or related plants by people from different regions and cultures provides indirect evidence for bioactiv...

show abstract

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Phylogenies reveal predictive power of traditional medicine in bioprospecting

Saslis‐Lagoudakis

Savolainen

Williamson

et al. 2012

Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A.

218

191

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…Several books focus on the uses of native and introduced plant species that have sustained human life (Balick 2009;Clarke 2011;Cox 1994;Whistler 2001). Searching the main full-text scientific databases may provide some papers on ethnobotanical approaches (Brooker et al 1989;Haberle 2005;Merlin 2000;Sillitoe 1995;Smith 1991), but they are not centered on wild edibles and there are few more recent articles. Brooker et al (1989) provided an overview on the history of the utilization of New Zealand native flora and mentioned some of the root crops, leafy vegetables, fruits, beverages, seaweeds, and fungi used by the Maori and early settlers.…”

Section: Oceaniamentioning

confidence: 99%

“…& Forst. L. f.); the sea-lettuce (Ulva lactuca L.), which is green like ordinary lettuce and was used extensively by the Maori as a vegetable (Brooker et al 1989).…”

Section: Oceaniamentioning

confidence: 99%

The Consumption of Wild Edible Plants

Carvalho

Barata

2016

Wild Plants, Mushrooms and Nuts

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

“…Natural alkaloids have proven especially broad-ranging and effective in their medicinal effects (8). These compounds arise as secondary metabolic products in many lineages of plants, but especially in the tropics and in productive habitats (65), where their role in plant defense against insect herbivory has been particularly important.…”

Section: Lox I: Measuring Biological Diversit?mentioning

confidence: 99%