Pharmacognostical Assessment of Novel Potential Medicinal Plants

World Health Organisation (WHO) stresses the need for total involvement of traditional systems of medicine to meet the goal ""Health for All"". The Traditional systems of medicine includes several plants/plant parts known as crude drugs which are used in many therapeutic formulations. Pharmacognostical Assessment of Novel Potential Medicinal plants provide pharmacognostical, physicochemical and chromatography details on 22 drugs (covering 27 species) used in Ayurveda/Siddha/Homoeopathy which are useful in the identification of these drugs and also help to establish biomarker compounds. Some taxa like Asparagus gonoclados, Cryptocoryne spiralis, Flickingeria nodosa, Homonoia riparia, Nothosaerva brachiata, Nymphoides hydrophylla, Nymphoides indica, Smilax zeylanica, Triumfetta rhomboidea are dealt with as potential novel alternate sources for the accepted botanical source.The pharmacognostical features evaluated in this book are useful for the authentication and identification of different species of the medicinal plant/drug. The book will be useful to students and research workers of Pharmacognosy, Ayurveda, Siddha, Botany, herbalists, foresters, natural products, pharmacologists and to all those interested in medicinal plants. About the Author S.N. Yoganarasimhan was the Head of Medicinal Plants Division at the Regional Research Institute (Ay.) (CCRAS), Bangalore and Adjunct Professor and Research Co-ordinator, Department of Pharmacognosy, Faculty of Pharmacy, Ramaiah University of Applied Sciences, Bangalore. His areas of interest and specialization are Plant Taxonomy, Floristics, Ethno-botany, Medicinal Plants and Pharmacognosy. He has supervised several Master's and Doctoral degree theses. He has more than 50 years of research experience and is recipient of many awards. He has a number of research papers and reviews to his credit. This is his eighth book.Magadi R. Gurudeva was Professor of Botany at Visveswarapura College of Science, Bangalore for more than 30 years. He has specialized in Embryology and Tissue Culture of Orchids. His areas of interest besides his specialization are Ethno-botany, Medicinal Plants, Plant Taxonomy and Pharmacognosy. He has published many research papers besides books on medicinal plants, both in English and Kannada.R. Deveswaran is Associate Professor at Faculty of Pharmacy, Ramaiah University of Applied Sciences. He has 17 years of teaching and research experience, specialized in novel and controlled release delivery systems. His other areas of interest are analytical method development and polymer science. He is associated with Industry sponsored projects, supervised several Master's degree theses, published 65 research papers, filed one Indian patent, co-authored two books and is on the editorial board of international journals. V. Madhavan is the Dean and Head of the Dept. of Pharmacognosy, Faculty of Pharmacy, Ramaiah University of Applied Sciences, Bangalore with more than 30 years of experience in Academics and Research. His specialization is Pharmacognosy. His areas of interest include Standardization & Characterization of herbal drugs besides Pharmacological evaluation of medicinal plants. He has supervised several Post-graduate students and Ph.D. scholars working on standardization of medicinal plants used in Ayurveda for their degrees. He has a number of research papers to his credit.