''Rehmannia'' is a genus of seven species of

flowering plant Flowering plants are plants that bear flowers and fruits, and form the clade Angiospermae (). The term angiosperm is derived from the Ancient Greek, Greek words (; 'container, vessel') and (; 'seed'), meaning that the seeds are enclosed with ...

s in the order

Lamiales The Lamiales (also known as the mint order) are an order of flowering plants in the asterids clade of the Eudicots. Under the APG IV system of flowering plant classification the order consists of 24 families, and includes about 23,810 species ...

and family

Orobanchaceae Orobanchaceae, the broomrapes, is a family (biology), family of mostly parasitic plants of the order (biology), order Lamiales, with about 90 genus, genera and more than 2000 species. Many of these genera (e.g., ''Pedicularis'', ''Rhinanthus'', ...

, which is

native Native may refer to: People * '' Jus sanguinis'', nationality by blood * '' Jus soli'', nationality by location of birth * Indigenous peoples, peoples with a set of specific rights based on their historical ties to a particular territory ** Nat ...

China China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. With population of China, a population exceeding 1.4 billion, it is the list of countries by population (United Nations), second-most populous country after ...

and Japan. It has been placed as the only member of the

monotypic In biology, a monotypic taxon is a taxonomic group (taxon) that contains only one immediately subordinate taxon. A monotypic species is one that does not include subspecies or smaller, infraspecific taxa. In the case of genera, the term "unisp ...

tribe Rehmannieae, but molecular phylogenetic studies suggest that it forms a clade with ''

Triaenophora ''Triaenophora'' is a genus of flowering plants native to Temperate Asia. Molecular phylogenetic studies place it in the tribe Rehmannieae of the family Orobanchaceae, although , Plants of the World Online continued to place it in Plantaginaceae. ...

''. Contrary to the vast majority of the taxa of Orobanchaceae, ''Rehmannia'' is not parasitic.

Systematics

Etymology

''Rehmannia'' is named for Joseph Rehmann (1788–1831), a physician who worked in

St. Petersburg Saint Petersburg, formerly known as Petrograd and later Leningrad, is the second-largest city in Russia after Moscow. It is situated on the River Neva, at the head of the Gulf of Finland on the Baltic Sea. The city had a population of 5,601, ...

.Gledhill, David (2008). "The Names of Plants". Cambridge University Press. (hardback), (paperback). pp 328

Homonymy

The name "Rehmannia" has also been given to a

genus Genus (; : genera ) is a taxonomic rank above species and below family (taxonomy), family as used in the biological classification of extant taxon, living and fossil organisms as well as Virus classification#ICTV classification, viruses. In bino ...

Jurassic The Jurassic ( ) is a Geological period, geologic period and System (stratigraphy), stratigraphic system that spanned from the end of the Triassic Period million years ago (Mya) to the beginning of the Cretaceous Period, approximately 143.1 Mya. ...

ammonite Ammonoids are extinct, (typically) coiled-shelled cephalopods comprising the subclass Ammonoidea. They are more closely related to living octopuses, squid, and cuttlefish (which comprise the clade Coleoidea) than they are to nautiluses (family N ...

s of the family Reineckeidae.

Classification

The genus was included in the family

Scrophulariaceae The Scrophulariaceae are a family of flowering plants, commonly known as the figwort family. The plants are annual and perennial herbs, as well as shrubs. Flowers have bilateral (zygomorphic) or rarely radial (actinomorphic) symmetry. The Scr ...

Gesneriaceae Gesneriaceae, the gesneriad family, is a family (biology), family of flowering plants consisting of about 152 genera and ca. 3,540 species in the tropics and subtropics of the Old World (almost all Didymocarpoideae) and the New World (most Ges ...

in some older classifications. The current placement of the genus is in neither Scrophulariaceae s.s. nor

Plantaginaceae Plantaginaceae, the plantain family or veronica family, is a large, diverse family (biology), family of flowering plants in the order Lamiales that includes common flowers such as Antirrhinum, snapdragon and Digitalis, foxglove. It is unrelated ...

s.l. (to which many other former Scrophulariaceae have been transferred). Earlier molecular studies suggested that its closest relatives were the genera '' Lancea'' and ''

Mazus ''Mazus'' is a genus of low-growing perennial plants. It has been placed in various plant families including Phrymaceae, Scrophulariaceae, and recently in the family Mazaceae. page 47 Consisting of around 40 species, this genus is generally fo ...

'', which have been included in

Phrymaceae Phrymaceae, also known as the lopseed family, is a small family of flowering plants in the order Lamiales.Peter F. Stevens (2001 onwards). "Phrymaceae" At: Angiosperm Phylogeny Website. At: Botanical Databases At: Missouri Botanical Garden Websi ...

. Subsequently, it was found that ''Rehmannia'' groups with ''

'', and both taxa are jointly the sister group to ''

Lindenbergia ''Lindenbergia'' is a genus of herbaceous plants in the order Lamiales and in the broomrape family Orobanchaceae. It is one of the few genera of the family which are not parasitic. It contains about 15 species found from northeast Africa across A ...

'' and the parasitic Orobanchaceae. A 2016 classification of flowering plants, the

APG IV system The APG IV system of flowering plant classification is the fourth version of a modern, mostly molecular-based, system of plant taxonomy for flowering plants (angiosperms) being developed by the Angiosperm Phylogeny Group (APG). It was publish ...

enlarged Orobanchaceae to include ''Rehmannia'', making it one of the few genera in the family, along with ''Lindenbergia'', not to be parasitic.

Species list

Plants of the World Online Plants of the World Online (POWO) is an online taxonomic database published by the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew. History Following the Convention on Biological Diversity, the Royal Botanic Gardens in Kew launched Plants of the World Online i ...

accepted seven species:

Uses

Sometimes known as Chinese foxglove due to its superficial resemblance to the genus ''

Digitalis ''Digitalis'' ( or ) is a genus of about 20 species of herbaceous perennial plants, shrubs, and Biennial plant, biennials, commonly called foxgloves. ''Digitalis'' is native to Europe, Western Asia, and northwestern Africa. The flowers are ...

'', the species of ''Rehmannia'' are perennial herbs. The plants have large flowers and are grown as ornamental garden plants in

Europe Europe is a continent located entirely in the Northern Hemisphere and mostly in the Eastern Hemisphere. It is bordered by the Arctic Ocean to the north, the Atlantic Ocean to the west, the Mediterranean Sea to the south, and Asia to the east ...

and

North America North America is a continent in the Northern Hemisphere, Northern and Western Hemisphere, Western hemispheres. North America is bordered to the north by the Arctic Ocean, to the east by the Atlantic Ocean, to the southeast by South Ameri ...

, and are used medicinally in Asia.

Traditional Chinese medicine

Known as dìhuáng (

地 ''Di'' () is one of the oldest Chinese terms for the earth and a key concept or figure in Chinese philosophy and religion. It is widely considered to be one of three powers (', ) which are Heaven, Earth, and Humanity (, ). There is a significant ...

黄) or gān dìhuáng (

干 Radical 51 or radical dry () meaning "" or "" is one of 31 out of the total 214 Kangxi radicals written with three strokes. There are only nine characters derived from this radical, and some modern dictionaries have discontinued its use as a sec ...

黄 Huang or Hwang may refer to: Location * Huang County, former county in Shandong, China, current Longkou City * Yellow River, or Huang River, in China * Huangshan, mountain range in Anhui, China * Huang (state), state in ancient China. * Hwang Ri ...

) in

Chinese Chinese may refer to: * Something related to China * Chinese people, people identified with China, through nationality, citizenship, and/or ethnicity **Han Chinese, East Asian ethnic group native to China. **'' Zhonghua minzu'', the supra-ethnic ...

, ''R. glutinosa'' is used as a medicinal herb for many conditions within Chinese traditional formulations. It is the main ingredient in a mixture called si wu tang (four substance decoction) along with Dang gui, Chinese peony (bai shao yao), and Ligusticum striatum (chuan xiong) that is considered a fundamental medicine to support making blood. When two ingredients,

peach The peach (''Prunus persica'') is a deciduous tree first domesticated and Agriculture, cultivated in China. It bears edible juicy fruits with various characteristics, most called peaches and the glossy-skinned, non-fuzzy varieties called necta ...

(tao ren) and

safflower Safflower (''Carthamus tinctorius'') is a highly branched, herbaceous, thistle-like annual plant in the family Asteraceae. It is one of the world's oldest crops; today, it is commercially cultivated for vegetable oil extracted from the seeds. ...

(hong hua), are added, it is called tao hong si wu tang (four substance decoction with peach pit and safflower), which is used in traditional chinese medicine for fatigue.

Chemical constituents

''Rehmannia'' contains the vitamins A, B, C, and D, as well as other compounds, such as

catalpol Catalpol is an iridoid glucoside. This natural product falls in the class of iridoid glycosides, which are simply monoterpenes with a glucose molecule attached. Natural occurrence First isolated in 1962, catalpol was named for plants in the ge ...

, an

iridoid Iridoids are a type of monoterpenoids in the general form of cyclopentanopyran, found in a wide variety of plants and some animals. They are biosynthetically derived from 8-oxogeranial. Iridoids are typically found in plants as glycosides, mo ...

glycoside In chemistry, a glycoside is a molecule in which a sugar is bound to another functional group via a glycosidic bond. Glycosides play numerous important roles in living organisms. Many plants store chemicals in the form of inactive glycosides. ...

References

External links

{{Taxonbar, from=Q3313262 Medicinal plants of Asia Dietary supplements Plants used in traditional Chinese medicine Orobanchaceae genera