Abstract

PRELIMINARY PHYTOCHEMICAL AND PHARMACOGNOSTIC INVESTIGATION OF EULOPHIA OCHREATA LINDL. TUBERS (ORCHIDACEAE)

Akshada A. Koparde* and Dr. C. S. Magdum

Abstract

Objective: Eulophia ochreata Lindl (Orchidaceae) is an important traditional medicinal plant,but unknown to most of the people and widely used in treatment of variety of disease by tribes of taluka maval. Plant is unexplored scientifically yet for their identification and use. Therefore, the current study was carried out to perform detailed pharmacognostical and phytochemical analysis of E.ochreata Lindl Method: Systematic pharmacognostic evaluation of tubers of E.ochreata Lindl has been carried out with respect to macroscopy, microscopy, and followed by preliminary phytochemical investigation and estimation of various chemical standards.Result: Tubers are fibrous, woody and perennial with numerous rootlets. Microscopic study shows the presence of cork layer with alternate lignified cells pink in colour, cortex, layer circular, parenchymatus ground tissue, fibro vascular bundles, muciligenous cells and crystals. Qualitative phytochemical test revealed the presence of most important that is alkaloids then saponin glycosides, mucilage, tannins, flavonoids, steroids and triterpenoid. Conclusions: Morphological, and phyto-chemical parameters studied in this paper may be proposed to establish the authenticity of plant Eulophia ochreata, and most important differentiating characteristic is yellow flowers which can probably, helps to differentiate the crude drug from its other species with respect to quality, purity and identification and revealing its important constituents present in plant.

Keywords: Eulophia ochreata, Orchidaceae, pharmacognostic, phytochemical, alkaloids, identification.