Cinchona, or Cinchona (Latin: Cinchona) is a medicinal South American plant used to treat malaria, or tropical fever. In Europe, the existence of these trees became known in the XVII century. Many species have been introduced into the nature of Southeast Asia and Africa.
Botanical Description
Most species are evergreen trees about 12–20 m in height. They have straight, slender trunks and a thick wide crown of ovoid shape. The bark is thick, brownish-gray, with a pronounced cork layer. The leaves are large, simple, elliptical, with solid edges, long thin stalks, pointed tip, smooth, leathery. On the shoots are opposite.
The flowers are fragrant, bisexual, about 1 cm in size, yellow, red or pink, slightly pubescent, collected in large panicles. During flowering, the hindu tree resembles a lilac.
Fruit capsules are dry, bivalve, grayish-brown in color, about 3 cm long. Inside, they contain flat, wrinkled seeds equipped with webbed wings.
Kinds
Popular chin trees:
- Cinghona is red juice. The plant reaches a height of more than 20 m, the inner part of the bark is dark red, leaves are up to 40 cm in size, with reddish veins, flowers are dark pink.
- Cinghon Ledger. The trees are of medium size, most specimens are about 10-12 m high, leaves are rounded, with pointed tips, inflorescences are dense, yellowish.
- Cinghona pharmacy. Compact trees are about 7–10 m in height. Leaves are smooth, elliptical. The bark on the inside is bright red. Flowers juicy carmine shade.
Many breeds are used as raw materials for the pharmaceutical industry.
Spread
The natural range is the eastern territories of the Andes. They grow at an altitude of 1000 m above sea level. These are tropical forest areas of Ecuador, northern Peru, Venezuela, Colombia, Bolivia. In the nature of the vast vast plantations, the quinous tree does not form.
For a long time Aborigines of the New World used powdered bark to treat patients, drank water infused with shoots. The wife of the Peruvian king Ana-del Chin-chong in 1638 was cured of these drugs by malaria. The case laid the foundation for studies of the chemical and medicinal properties of the plant. Small populations of trees began to be cut down for the production of anti-febrile medicines.
In the XIX century, the cultivation of cinnamon began in areas close in climatic conditions to the tropics of South America.
Attempts were made to plant and breed a tree in the southern regions of Russia. But tropical, thermophilic plants turned out to be completely unsuitable for winter temperature extremes, quickly freezing out. Even in the Caucasus and Crimea, cichons are found only in greenhouses of botanical gardens.
Chemical composition
The bark of the trunks, roots and shoots of the cinchona tree contain 25 alkaloids. These natural nitrogenous substances have strong pharmacological activity. Of Cinchona Quinine and its derivatives are mainly isolated: quinidine, cichonin, cichonidine. Their number depends on growth conditions and varies from 6 to 8%. In individual specimens, the concentration reaches 20%.
The tree bark also contains compounds of cuprein, hydroquinidine, epichinin, echinidin. In addition to alkaloids, anthraquinones, quinovine glycoside, quinine-tannic and quinic acids are isolated from the plant.
The chemicals found in the cortex have a powerful anti-febrile effect, regulate body temperature, reduce cramps, and improve contractility of muscle fibers.
Quinine has specific antimalarial activity. It destroys infectious plasmodia, weakens bouts of disease and prevents the appearance of new ones.
Alkaloids and other compounds stimulate cardiovascular activity, improve blood circulation to internal organs, expand the capillary network, and accelerate digestion.
Harvesting raw materials
Gather wild and cultural species. The top layer of the tree bark, cork, can be removed without the risk of death of cinnamon, because with time it grows again. Thinning is carried out on plantations every 6–7 years. Instances of the cinchona tree that have reached the age of 25 years are uprooted.
The bark is dried in the sun and sorted. The bare trunks are tied with layers of moss. The remains of cut down or uprooted plants are used as fuel and raw materials for tar and charcoal.
There are several varieties of quin bark:
- Red. It is collected from old trunks and branches. Her pieces are flat, wide and thick. On the outside, tuberous, porous, brown. On the inside - brick red, smooth.
- Yellow orange. This is the inner layer of the cortex of adult trunks. The pieces are tubular, smooth, about 2–6 mm wide, sometimes in the form of wide plates, about 20–30 cm long. The hue of the raw material is reddish yellow.
- Gray or brown. It is collected from lateral young branches and thin trunks. The bark plates are tubular, thin, about 1–5 mm, of a light grayish-yellow or brown hue.
Dry raw materials are tested for suitability. To do this, it is ground into powder and heated in a test tube. Allocated dark raspberry tar drops indicate a high content of necessary chemicals.
Application
Pharmaceutical preparations are mainly made from cinnamon. On the basis of quinine secreted from the bark, a number of medications have been developed that are used in traditional medicine:
- quinine dehydrochloride - a medicinal solution for injection;
- quinine powder;
- quinidine sulfate is a tablet preparation.
These agents are used to treat and prevent exacerbations of malaria, stimulate labor, treat atrial fibrillation and other heart diseases.
With the development of chemical synthesis of alkaloids, the use of natural raw materials in pharmacology has declined.
Cinnamon bitterness - the basis for the gin and tonic drink. Initially, water infused with powder from bark or shoots was included in the ration of the British military serving in tropical colonies. Thus, malaria was prevented. To eliminate bitterness, the drink was diluted with gin. Subsequently, sweetened tonic with the addition of a small amount of quinine and alcohol began to be used as an aperitif that improves appetite.
Alternative medicine
An aqueous infusion of crushed bark and twigs of a quinine tree is used as a means to eliminate various digestive disorders. It helps in the absence of appetite, insufficient secretion of gastric juice, decreased acidity, nausea, bloating, biliary dyskinesia, and lazy intestines.
Hina is used as a disinfectant, astringent, antimicrobial and anti-inflammatory agent for colds, bronchitis, dysentery, typhoid fever, whooping cough. In the postpartum period in women, the quinine infusion enhances uterine contractions and helps restore the reproductive system.
Homeopathy
Juice isolated from the cortex is used in the manufacture of homeopathic preparations for the treatment of intestinal pathologies, oncological neoplasms of internal organs, neurological disorders, headaches, radiculitis, sciatica, chronic joint inflammation, diseases of the spleen, liver, gall bladder, stomach, heart rhythm disturbances, and vegetovascular dystonia.