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Rauvolfia Afra
''Rauvolfia afra'' is a tree in the family Apocynaceae. It is commonly known as the quinine tree. These trees are distributed from the Eastern Cape of South Africa to tropical Africa and are found in low-lying forests near rivers and streams, or on floodplain A floodplain or flood plain or bottomlands is an area of land adjacent to a river. Floodplains stretch from the banks of a river channel to the base of the enclosing valley, and experience flooding during periods of high Discharge (hydrolog ...s. Taxonomy The original etymology of the species name ''caffra'' is related to kaffir, an ethnic slur used towards black people in Africa. At the July 2024 International Botanical Congress, a vote was held with the result that "''caffra''" related names will be amended to ''afra'' related ones, with this being implemented at the end of July 2024. Gallery Image:Rauvolfia_caffra_leaves_fruit.JPG, Image:Quininetree (Rauvolfia caffra) (11452988133).jpg, Image:Rauvolfia c ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Botanic Gardens Conservation International
Botanic Gardens Conservation International (BGCI) is a plant conservation biology, conservation Charitable organization, charity based in Kew, Surrey, England. It is a membership organisation, working with 800 botanic gardens in 118 countries, whose combined work forms the world's largest plant conservation network. Founded in 1987, BGCI is a Charitable organization, registered charity in the United Kingdom, and its members include the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew and the Royal Botanic Garden, Edinburgh, as two of its key supporters. The founder and director from 1987 to 1993 was Professor Vernon H Heywood. He was followed in 1994 by Dr. Peter Wyse Jackson (as Secretary-General) who led BGCI till 2005 when Sara Oldfield succeeded him. She was then followed by Paul Smith in 2016 (current acting Secretary-General of BGCI). BGCI's patron is Charles III. Lady Suzanne Warner was Chair of BGCI from December 1999 to December 2004. She received an OBE in the Queen's 2006 New Year's Honours ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
South Africa
South Africa, officially the Republic of South Africa (RSA), is the Southern Africa, southernmost country in Africa. Its Provinces of South Africa, nine provinces are bounded to the south by of coastline that stretches along the Atlantic Ocean, South Atlantic and Indian Ocean; to the north by the neighbouring countries of Namibia, Botswana, and Zimbabwe; to the east and northeast by Mozambique and Eswatini; and it encloses Lesotho. Covering an area of , the country has Demographics of South Africa, a population of over 64 million people. Pretoria is the administrative capital, while Cape Town, as the seat of Parliament of South Africa, Parliament, is the legislative capital, and Bloemfontein is regarded as the judicial capital. The largest, most populous city is Johannesburg, followed by Cape Town and Durban. Cradle of Humankind, Archaeological findings suggest that various hominid species existed in South Africa about 2.5 million years ago, and modern humans inhabited the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Plants Described In 1850
Plants are the eukaryotes that form the kingdom Plantae; they are predominantly photosynthetic. This means that they obtain their energy from sunlight, using chloroplasts derived from endosymbiosis with cyanobacteria to produce sugars from carbon dioxide and water, using the green pigment chlorophyll. Exceptions are parasitic plants that have lost the genes for chlorophyll and photosynthesis, and obtain their energy from other plants or fungi. Most plants are multicellular, except for some green algae. Historically, as in Aristotle's biology, the plant kingdom encompassed all living things that were not animals, and included algae and fungi. Definitions have narrowed since then; current definitions exclude fungi and some of the algae. By the definition used in this article, plants form the clade Viridiplantae (green plants), which consists of the green algae and the embryophytes or land plants ( hornworts, liverworts, mosses, lycophytes, ferns, conifers and other gymnosp ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Quinine
Quinine is a medication used to treat malaria and babesiosis. This includes the treatment of malaria due to ''Plasmodium falciparum'' that is resistant to chloroquine when artesunate is not available. While sometimes used for nocturnal leg cramps, quinine is not recommended for this purpose due to the risk of serious side effects. It can be taken by mouth or intravenously. Malaria resistance to quinine occurs in certain areas of the world. Quinine is also used as an ingredient in tonic water and other beverages to impart a bitter taste. Common side effects include headache, tinnitus, ringing in the ears, vision issues, and sweating. More severe side effects include deafness, thrombocytopenia, low blood platelets, and an irregular heartbeat. Use can make one more prone to sunburn. While it is unclear if use during pregnancy carries potential for fetal harm, treating malaria during pregnancy with quinine when appropriate is still recommended. Quinine is an alkaloid, a natural ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Rauvolfia
''Rauvolfia'' (sometimes spelled ''Rauwolfia'') is a genus of evergreen trees and shrubs, commonly known as devil peppers, in the family Apocynaceae. The genus is named to honor Leonhard Rauwolf. The genus can mainly be found in Tropics, tropical regions of Africa, Asia, Latin America, and various oceanic islands. Spelling The International Code of Nomenclature for algae, fungi, and plants stipulates that the genus name was established by Carl Linnaeus in his 1753 book ''Species Plantarum'', which cites his earlier description which states in Botanical Latin#Alphabet, Botanical Latin that the name is dedicated "to Leonhard Rauwolf": "''Leon. Rauvolfio''". Although some subsequent authors hypercorrection, hypercorrected the Classical Latin letter "v" to a modern "w", this is not accepted by the code of nomenclature. Chemical constituents ''Rauvolfia serpentina'', commonly known as Indian snakeroot or ''sarpagandha'', contains many indole alkaloids. Medicinal uses Reserpine i ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
International Botanical Congress
International Botanical Congress (IBC) is an international meeting of Botany, botanists in all scientific fields, authorized by the International Association of Botanical and Mycological Societies (IABMS) and held every six years, with the location rotating between different continents. The current numbering system for the congresses starts from the year 1900; the XX IBC was in Madrid, Spain, July 2024. The XXI IBC is planned to be in Cape Town, South Africa, in July 2029. The IBC has the power to alter the ICN (International Code of Nomenclature for algae, fungi, and plants), which was renamed from the International Code of Botanical Nomenclature (ICBN) at the XVIII IBC. Formally the power resides with the Plenary Session; in practice this approves the decisions of the Nomenclature Section. The Nomenclature Section meets before the actual Congress and deals with all proposals to modify the Code: this includes ratifying recommendations from sub-committees on conserved name, conserv ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Kaffir (racial Term)
Kaffir () is an exonym and an ethnic slur the use of it in reference to Black South Africans, black people being particularly common in South Africa and to some degree Namibia and the former Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe). In Arabic, the word ''kāfir'' ("unbeliever") was originally applied to paganism, non-Islam, Muslims of any ethnic background before becoming predominantly focused on pagan ''zanj'' (sub-Saharan African) who were increasingly used zanj slaves, as slaves. During the Age of Exploration in early modern Europe, variants of the Latin term (pl. ) were adopted in reference to non-Muslim Bantu peoples even when they were monotheistic. It was eventually used, particularly in Afrikaans (), for any black person during the Apartheid era, Apartheid and History of South Africa (1994–present), Post-Apartheid eras, closely associated with South African racism. While originally not pejorative, it became a pejorative by the mid-20th century and is now considered extremely offensiv ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Floodplain
A floodplain or flood plain or bottomlands is an area of land adjacent to a river. Floodplains stretch from the banks of a river channel to the base of the enclosing valley, and experience flooding during periods of high Discharge (hydrology), discharge.Goudie, A. S., 2004, ''Encyclopedia of Geomorphology'', vol. 1. Routledge, New York. The soils usually consist of clays, silts, sands, and gravels deposited during floods. Because of regular flooding, floodplains frequently have high soil fertility since nutrients are deposited with the flood waters. This can encourage farming; some important agricultural regions, such as the Nile and Mississippi Basin, Mississippi Drainage basin, river basins, heavily exploit floodplains. Agricultural and urban regions have developed near or on floodplains to take advantage of the rich soil and freshwater. However, the Flood risk, risk of inundation has led to increasing efforts to Flood control, control flooding. Formation Most floodplai ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Tropical Africa
The Afrotropical realm is one of the Earth's eight biogeographic realms. It includes Sub-Saharan Africa, the southern Arabian Peninsula, the island of Madagascar, and the islands of the western Indian Ocean. It was formerly known as the Ethiopian Zone or Ethiopian Region. Major ecological regions Most of the Afrotropical realm, except for Africa's southern tip, has a tropical climate. A broad belt of deserts, including the Atlantic and Sahara deserts of northern Africa and the Arabian Desert of the Arabian Peninsula, separates the Afrotropic from the Palearctic realm, which includes northern Africa and temperate Eurasia. Sahel and Sudan South of the Sahara, two belts of tropical grassland and savanna run east and west across the continent, from the Atlantic Ocean to the Ethiopian Highlands. Immediately south of the Sahara lies the Sahel belt, a transitional zone of semi-arid short grassland and vachellia savanna. Rainfall increases further south in the Sudanian Savanna, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Eastern Cape
The Eastern Cape ( ; ) is one of the nine provinces of South Africa. Its capital is Bhisho, and its largest city is Gqeberha (Port Elizabeth). Due to its climate and nineteenth-century towns, it is a common location for tourists. It is also known for having been home to many anti-apartheid activists, including Nelson Mandela. The second largest province in the country (at 168,966 km2) after the Northern Cape, it was formed in 1994 out of the Xhosa people, Xhosa homelands or bantustans of Transkei and Ciskei, together with the eastern portion of the Cape Province. The central and eastern part of the province is the traditional home of the indigenous Xhosa people. In 1820 this area, which was known as the Xhosa Kingdom, began to be settled by Europeans who originally came from England, Scotland and Ireland. Eastern Cape is the only province in South Africa were the number of Black Africans declined from 86.6% to 85.7% since Apartheid ended in 1994. History The Eastern Cape p ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Otto Wilhelm Sonder
Otto Wilhelm Sonder (18 June 1812, Bad Oldesloe – 21 November 1881) was a German botanist and pharmacist. Life A native of Holstein, Sonder studied at Kiel University, where he sat pharmaceutical examinations in 1835, before becoming the proprietor of a pharmacy in Hamburg from 1841 to 1878. In 1846 he received an honorary doctorate from the University of Königsberg and was elected a member of the German National Academy of Sciences Leopoldina for his contribution to the field of botany. Herbarium From a young age, Sonder showed considerable interest and skill in Botany. He often embarked on botanical excursions in his local area early in the morning before heading to work at the pharmacy. Throughout his life, Sonder met and conversed with many eminent botanists of the era. He amassed an extensive botanical collection that contained hundreds of thousands of herbarium specimens representing all major plant groups and spanning all parts of the globe. The collection is partic ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Apocynaceae
Apocynaceae (, from '' Apocynum'', Greek for "dog-away") is a family of flowering plants that includes trees, shrubs, herbs, stem succulents, and vines, commonly known as the dogbane family, because some taxa were used as dog poison. Notable members of the family include oleander, dogbanes, milkweeds, and periwinkles. The family is native to the European, Asian, African, Australian, and American tropics or subtropics, with some temperate members as well. The former family Asclepiadaceae (now known as Asclepiadoideae) is considered a subfamily of Apocynaceae and contains 348 genera. A list of Apocynaceae genera may be found here. Many species are tall trees found in tropical forests, but some grow in tropical dry ( xeric) environments. Also perennial herbs from temperate zones occur. Many of these plants have milky latex, and many species are poisonous if ingested, the family being rich in genera containing alkaloids and cardiac glycosides, those containing the latter oft ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
