PHARMACOGNOSTICAL AND PHYTOCHEMICAL EVALUATION OF PIPER LONGUM L. SPIKE OBTAINED FROM TISSUE CULTURE AND NATURAL HABITAT: A COMPARATIVE STUDY

Abstract

Piper longum L. is a slender perennial climber used in Ayurveda particularly for respiratory tract disorders. Both spikes and roots of this plant are said to have medicinal value. Over the years, industrial demand of Pippali is continuously increasing which is largely met by collection from its natural habitat, endangering its natural resource. Red list status of P. longum L. has been assessed and it is included in the short supply list of medicinal plants. As conventional propagation shows delayed rooting and crop losses, there is a need for alternative propagation methods to conserve and sustain it. Micro propagation is an emerging method to propagate plants which allows rapid multiplication of disease free plants in limited time and space. Thus the purpose of the study is to evaluate whether the tissue cultured plant differs from the natural variety. Pippali spikes were collected from tissue culture and natural variety P. longum L. plants. Pharmacognostical study, comparative TLC and HPTLC were conducted and the results revealed that inspite of some differences; there are similarities between both the samples. Since the major phyto-constituents are present, the tissue culture Pippali will perform all the major pharmacological actions which are attributed to the natural variety. Thus, micro propagation of P. longum L. can be adopted for mass multiplication of healthy and disease free plants thereby arriving at a solution for conservation of its species. Hence it can be used as an alternate method to overcome the scarcity of natural Pippali.