Horse Chestnut: Cultivation for Ornamental Purposes and Non-Food Crop Production

Abstract

The horse chestnut (Aesculus hippocastanum L.) is a common ornamental tree that possesses numerous useful derivatives (escin, cholesterol-escin complex, glycolic, soft and dry extracts, esculin) in different parts of the plant, especially the seeds and trunk bark. These derivatives are widely used in dermatology and pharmacology, mainly for the treatment of peripheral chronic venous insufficiency, but also in the cosmetic field for the treatment of unattractive features, such as couperose, cellulites and hair loss. More recently proanthocyanidin A 2 , present in the fruit pericarp, bark, leaves, and buds, has shown a protective effect against UV damage. Very little, however, is known about methods for cultivation, chemical composition of seeds of various genotypes, optimum harvest-time of plant tissues, or storage conditions for seeds. This review has been done within the context of the EU research project on the "European Aesculus Cultivation System" in order to better understand the growth and pharmacological properties of secondary metabolites from horse chestnut and may represent the first step towards use of the plant in non-food, income-generating arboriculture of European countries.

Aesculus pavia foliar saponins: defensive role against the leafminer Cameraria ohridella

“…Preliminary investigations, based also on the simple observation that only A. pavia leaves shaken in water originated a dense persisting foam, indicated the presence of saponins within leaf tissues of the red‐flowering horse chestnut tree. On the other hand, as reported in the literature,14 saponins were not detected in the leaves of the C. ohridella ‐susceptible A. hippocastanum white‐flowering trees, but only in fruits.…”

Biological Flora of the British Isles: Aesculus hippocastanum

“…Horse‐chestnut has, however, been extensively planted since the 17th century (Section 10) across central Europe and south into Italy and Serbia (Figure ). It is also grown widely in urban areas of Iran, northern India, Asia Minor, United States, Canada (as far north as Edmonton, Alberta) and New Zealand (Kapusta et al., ; Loenhart, ; Zhang et al., ) and further north in the Faeroe Islands, Iceland and Norway (Højgaard, Jóhansen, & Ødum, ), still producing fruit at 65°N in Sweden and Norway (Bellini & Nin, ). It was introduced into the United States most probably in 1746 in Philadelphia (Anon, ).…”

“…Horse‐chestnut is generally found in the lowlands of Britain but reaches 505 m altitude at Ashgill (Cumberland) (Preston et al., ) and 1,300 m in Sweden and Norway (Bellini & Nin, ). It occurs at 218–1,485 m in its native range in Greece and Bulgaria, and up to c .…”

“…Rat and mice models have been used to show that seed extracts also relieve diabetic nephropathy and thromboses (Ahmad et al., ; Elmas, Erbas, & Yigitturk, ), reduce ethanol absorption (Yoshikawa et al., ), reduce cholesterol in mice fed a high‐fat diet (Avcı, Küçükkurt, Akkol, & Yeşilada, ) and protect against bacterial endotoxemic injuries in mice livers (Jiang et al., ). Seed extracts also have anti‐inflammatory and anti‐oedematous properties (Dumitriu, Olariu, Nita, Zglimbe, & Rosoiu, ; Matsuda et al., ; Sirtori, ; Vasiliauskas, Leonavičienė, Vaitkienė, Bradūnaitė, & Lukšienė, ; Wilkinson & Brown, ) and so have proved effective at clearing skin conditions as an antiwrinkle treatment and in reducing skin ageing (Fujimura et al., ; Masaki, Sakaki, Atsumi, & Sakurai, ) and may help against cellulite and hair loss (Bellini & Nin, ). Extracts of leaves and the bark of young branches have also proved effective as an antioxidant and anti‐inflammatory drug (Braga et al., ; Margină et al., ) and one of the most effective plant extracts in inhibiting Candida albicans (Tambur et al., ).…”

“…Bean () and Bellini and Nin () list a number of varieties, cultivars and forms. Of these, A. hippocastanum 'Baumannii' is particularly common; this is a double‐flowered, fruitless variety (Hoar, ) planted where conker hunting by children has been seen as a problem (Leathart, ).…”