The Magic Velvet Bean of Mucuna pruriens

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Abstract

Mucuna pruriens (Fabaceae) is an established herbal drug used for the management of male infertility, nervous disorders, and also as an aphrodisiac. It has been shown that its seeds are potentially of substantial medicinal importance. The ancient Indian medical system, Ayurveda, traditionally used M. pruriens, even to treat such things as Parkinson's disease. M. pruriens has been shown to have anti-parkinson and neuroprotective effects, which may be related to its anti-oxidant activity. In addition, anti-oxidant activity of M. pruriens has been also demonstrated in vitro by its ability to scavenge DPPH radicals and reactive oxygen species. In this review the medicinal properties of M. pruriens are summarized, taking in consideration the studies that have used the seeds extracts and the leaves extracts.

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Author and article information

Journal

Journal ID (nlm-ta): J Tradit Complement Med

Journal ID (iso-abbrev): J Tradit Complement Med

Journal ID (publisher-id): JTCM

Title: Journal of Traditional and Complementary Medicine

Publisher: Medknow Publications & Media Pvt Ltd (India )

ISSN (Electronic): 2225-4110

Publication date (Print): Oct-Dec 2012

Volume: 2

Issue: 4

Pages: 331-339

Affiliations

[1 ]Department of Chemistry, University of Siena, Italy.

[2 ]Department of Internal Medicine, Endocrine-Metabolic Sciences and Biochemistry, University of Siena, Italy.

[3 ]Department of Life Science and Biotechnologies, University of Ferrara, Ferrara, Italy

[4 ]Department of Food and Nutrition, Kyung Hee University, Seoul, South Korea

Author notes

[* ] Correspondence to: Prof. Giuseppe Valacchi , Department of Life Science and Biotechnologies, University of Ferrara, Via Borsari 46, Ferrara, 44100, Tel: +39 0532 455482, Fax: +30 0532 455450, Giuseppe.valacchi@ 123456unife.it

Article

Publisher ID: JTCM-2-331

DOI: 10.1016/S2225-4110(16)30119-5

PMC ID: 3942911

PubMed ID: 24716148

SO-VID: 4bb8130b-72cc-4b7a-ade3-fa74a9d63fc3

License:

This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 Unported, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

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