''Acronychia pedunculata'' is a large shrub or small tree of the understory, gaps and fringes of low country and lower hill tropical forests of tropical Asia.

Description

Leaves: elliptic to suboblong, often with tapered base. Twigs more or less angular, glabrous. Flowers: greenish white; I-acillary, corymbose panicles, about across in inflorescences of wide. Flowering: February–April, July–August. The fruits are cream to brownish yellow drupes, slightly angled, in diameter with a short apiculate tip. Leaves and fruits, and other parts of the plant, contain aromatic oils with a resinous scent. In Sri Lanka, the flowering time is February–April and July–August.

Distribution

South and Southeast Asia from India & Sri Lanka to South China & Taiwan,

Indochina Mainland Southeast Asia, also known as the Indochinese Peninsula or Indochina, is the continental portion of Southeast Asia. It lies east of the Indian subcontinent and south of Mainland China and is bordered by the Indian Ocean to the west an ...

Malesia Malesia is a biogeographical region straddling the Equator and the boundaries of the Indomalayan and Australasian realms, and also a phytogeographical floristic region in the Paleotropical Kingdom. It has been given different definitions. Th ...

& Papua New Guinea.

Local names

* * * Nepali: Paolay * Assamese: Laojan * Tamil & Malayalam: Mutta-nari

Uses

Extracts of its leaves, bark, stems and fruits are widely used in herbal medicinal applications against sores, scabies and intestinal infections, due to their antifungal and antimicrobial properties. Contains aromatic, essential oils, which are used in China for making perfumes. The ripe fruit is edible and has a sweet acidic flavor. Unripe fruits have a strongly astringent, resinous taste. The roots are used as a fish-poison in southern Vietnam. In India the wood is used for carving, poles, house construction and making the charcoal preferred by goldsmiths. And the tender leaves are used in salads and as a condiment. Its wood, called

lakawood Lakawood, or laka wood ( ms, kayu laka), is a reddish aromatic heartwood used as incense in China, India and South East Asia. It also had a number of other uses in the past, for example as a dye and for medicinal purposes. The name lakawood can re ...

(a term covering a few different plants), is also used in incense production. It is particularly favoured by Taoist practitioners who are forbidden from using

sandalwood Sandalwood is a class of woods from trees in the genus ''Santalum''. The woods are heavy, yellow, and fine-grained, and, unlike many other aromatic woods, they retain their fragrance for decades. Sandalwood oil is extracted from the woods for us ...

According to a paper by a scholar at the

University of Athens The National and Kapodistrian University of Athens (NKUA; el, Εθνικό και Καποδιστριακό Πανεπιστήμιο Αθηνών, ''Ethnikó ke Kapodistriakó Panepistímio Athinón''), usually referred to simply as the Univers ...

(July 2012), the acrovestone (molecular weight 554.67 g/

mole Mole (or Molé) may refer to: Animals * Mole (animal) or "true mole", mammals in the family Talpidae, found in Eurasia and North America * Golden moles, southern African mammals in the family Chrysochloridae, similar to but unrelated to Talpida ...

) contained in ''Acronychia pedunculata'' has significant cytotoxicity to prostate cancer and melanoma cells.

References

External links

Taxonomy (Accessed: 6.9.2010)

Taxonomy (Accessed: 6.9.2010)

Specimen distribution map at The International Plant Names Index (Accessed: 6.9.2010)

Description (Accessed: 6.9.2010)

Description (Accessed: 6.9.2010) {{Taxonbar, from=Q3595230 Acronychia, pedunculata