Abstract

PHARMACOLOGICAL EVIDENCES OF A ANCIENT TRADITIONAL SIDDHA HERB PIPER NIGRUM (PEPPER, MILAGU)- A CURRENT SCENARIO

Dr. R. Vijaya Nirmala* and Dr. R. Abinaya

ABSTRACT

Siddha system of medicine is one of the oldest traditional system of medicines contains flora, fauna, minerals and metals in their medicinal preparations. In current scientific world preferred to take herbal medicines for their health care needs, because of the lack of adverse effects of herbal medicines. Recent documentary of WHO states that nearly 80% of worlds populations needs herbal origin of medicines to satisfy the health care demands and also stated that 25% of current modern medicines were obtained from the herbal origin. Pepper (Piper nigrum) is one of the medicinal plant which have been used from ancient time. The medicinal uses of pepper have been represented in various siddha classical literatures. The main aim of this review is to explore the therapeutic potentials of Piper nigrum and it is also called as a “king of species” due their trade potentials in the international market. In this article the authors made efforts to explore the literature review, taxonomy, Metonymy, Etymology. Microscopic descriptions, Macroscopical descriptions, Chemical compositions, Geographical Distributions, Morphological Descriptions, Phytochemical analysis and Pharmacological activities of Piper nigrum.

Keywords: Pepper, Milagu, Siddha, Medicinal plant, Traditional system, King of Species, Chemical compositions, Pharmacological activities of Piper nigrum.