| Botany
Small tree growing 5 to
12 meters high. Leaves are pinnate, 20-60 cm long, with hairy rachis
and leaflets. Leaflets are opposite, 10 to 17 pairs, oblong, 5 to 10
cm in length. Flowers, about 1.5 cm long, and slightly fragrant. Fruit,
green and edible, about 4 cm long, subcylindric with 5 obscure, broad,
rounded, longitudinallobes.
Distribution
Cultvated and semi-cultivated
throughout the Philippines.
Parts
utilized
Whole plant.
Properties
and constituents
• Considered antibacterial, astringent, antiscorbutic, febrifuge,
antidiabetic, stomachic, refrigerant.
• Study on volatile components of AB fruits showed 6 mg/kg of
total volatile compounds; 62 compounds were identified, nonanal and
(Z)-3-hexenol were dominant.
Uses
Nutrition
Eaten raw.
Prepared as a relish and food flavoring.
Folkloric
• Skin diseases,
especially with pruritus: Reduce the leaves to a paste and apply tolerably
warm to areas of affected skin.
• Fruit juice used as eye drops.
• Post-partum and rectal inflammation: Infusion of leaves.
• Mumps, acne, and localized rheumatic complaints: Paste of leaves
applied to affected areas.
• Warm paste of leaves also used for pruritus.
• Used for boils, piles, rheumatism, cough, hypertension, whooping
cough, mumps and pimples.
• Cough and thrush: Infusion of flowers, 40 grams to a pint of
boiling water, 4 glasses of tea daily.
• Fever: Fruit as a cooling drink.
• The fruit has been used for a variety of maladies: beriberi,
cough, prevention of scurvy.
• Infusion of leaves also drank as a protective tonic after childbirth.
• In Malaysia, leaves are used for venereal
diseases.
• In Indonesia, leaves used for
boils, diabetes, mumps, fever.
• In French Guyana, fruit decoction or syrup use for hepatitis,
diarrhea, fever and other inflammatory conditions.
Others
• Because of high
oxalic acid content, fruit used to remove stains from clothing and for
washing hands, removing rust and stains from metal blades.
Studies
• Hypoglycemic / Hypotriglyceridemic / Anti-Atherogenic
/ Anti-Lipid Peroxidative:
Effects of Averrhoa bilimbi leaf extract on blood glucose and lipids
in streptozotocin-diabetic rats: Study showed
that AB extract has hypoglycemic, hypotriglyceridemic, anti-lipid peroxidative
and anti-atherogenic properties in STZ-diabetic rats.
• Antioxidant / Antimicrobial Activities:
The scavenging of NO by the extract of AC fruits was dependent on concentration
and stage of ripening. Extracts showed antimicrobial activity against
E coli, Salmonella typhi, staph aureus and bacillus cereus.
• Phytochemicals / Antimicrobial:
Phytochemical screening of fruit extracts yielded flavonoids, saponins
and triterpenoids but no alkaloids. The chloroform and methanol fruit
extracts were active againsxt Aeromonas hydrophilia, E coli, K pneumonia,
S cerrevisiae, S aureus, Strep agalactiae and B subtilis. In conclusion,
AB fruits possess potential antibacterial activities that warrants further
studies.
• Anti-diabetic:
Study showed the aqueous fraction was more potent than the butanol fraction
in the amelioration of hyperglycemia and hyperlipidemia in a high fat
diet-fed STZ diabetic rats and suggests the AF as the potential source
for isolation of the active principle for oral antidiabetic therapy.
• Anti-bacterial:
Study of the aqueous extract of AB leaves and fruits showed antibacterial
activity against Gram-positive and Gram-negative bacteria. The antibacterial
activity could be associated with the presence of bioactive compounds
of the flavonoids type, like luteolin and apigenin. The results suggest
further studies to isolate and identify the responsible compounds.
• Anti-Hyperlipidemic:
Study showed the fruit and its water extract, but not the alcohol and hexane extracts, to have remarkable antihypercholesterolemic activity. Results suggest the fruit can be used as a dietary ingredient to treat hyperlipidemia.
Availability
Wildcrafted.
Seasonal fruiting.
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