Breynia vitis-idaea C.E.C. Fischer or officinal breynia is a perennial arbor species of Phyllanthaceae

Phyllanthaceae

Phyllanthaceae is a family of flowering plants in the eudicot order Malpighiales. It is most closely related to the family Picrodendraceae. The Phyllanthaceae are most numerous in the tropics, with many in the south temperate zone, and a few ranging as far north as the middle of the north temperate...

 (Euphorbiaceae

Euphorbiaceae

Euphorbiaceae, the Spurge family are a large family of flowering plants with 300 genera and around 7,500 species. Most are herbs, but some, especially in the tropics, are also shrubs or trees. Some are succulent and resemble cacti....

 s.l.), found from India

India

India , officially the Republic of India , is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by geographical area, the second-most populous country with over 1.2 billion people, and the most populous democracy in the world...

 east to Taiwan

Taiwan

Taiwan , also known, especially in the past, as Formosa , is the largest island of the same-named island group of East Asia in the western Pacific Ocean and located off the southeastern coast of mainland China. The island forms over 99% of the current territory of the Republic of China following...

 and Okinawa and south to Indonesia

Indonesia

Indonesia , officially the Republic of Indonesia , is a country in Southeast Asia and Oceania. Indonesia is an archipelago comprising approximately 13,000 islands. It has 33 provinces with over 238 million people, and is the world's fourth most populous country. Indonesia is a republic, with an...

. It is a shrub or treelet with egg-shaped leaves that can reach up to 3 m tall. It has staminate flowers and spherical, red fruit.

B. vitis-idaea is an herbal medicine that has long been used to treat a variety of ailments. It contains the saponin

Saponin

Saponins are a class of chemical compounds, one of many secondary metabolites found in natural sources, with saponins found in particular abundance in various plant species...

 breynin and terpenic

Terpene

Terpenes are a large and diverse class of organic compounds, produced by a variety of plants, particularly conifers, though also by some insects such as termites or swallowtail butterflies, which emit terpenes from their osmeterium. They are often strong smelling and thus may have had a protective...

 and phenol

Phenol

Phenol, also known as carbolic acid, phenic acid, is an organic compound with the chemical formula C6H5OH. It is a white crystalline solid. The molecule consists of a phenyl , bonded to a hydroxyl group. It is produced on a large scale as a precursor to many materials and useful compounds...

ic glycoside

Glycoside

In chemistry, a glycoside is a molecule in which a sugar is bound to a non-carbohydrate moiety, usually a small organic molecule. Glycosides play numerous important roles in living organisms. Many plants store chemicals in the form of inactive glycosides. These can be activated by enzyme...

s. It is marketed in Taiwan as Chi R Yun. B. vitis-idaea poisoning causes hepatocellular liver injury.

Other names

B. officinalis Hemsley and B. officinalis var. accrescens (Hayata

Bunzo Hayata

was a Japanese botanist noted for his taxonomic work in Japan and Formosa . He was a professor at the Imperial University of Tokyo and third director of the Research Botanical Gardens....

) M.J.Deng & J.C.Wang are synonyms of B. vitis-idaea.

Other variants include:

• Breynia formosana (Hayata) Hayata
• Breynia officinalis Hemsley var. officinalis
• Breynia stipitata Muell. -Arg. var. formosana Hayata
• Breynia stipitata Muell. -Arg. var. formosana Hayata

Other common names in English include:

• Formosan breynia
• Large calyx breynia
• Medicinal breynia

Common names in other languages include:), ดับพิษ (dapphit; dàp pʰít) (northern), ก้างปลาทะเล (kāngplāthalē; kâːŋ plaː tʰáʔ leː), ผักหวานตัวผู้ (phakwāntūaphū; pʰàk wǎːn tuːa pʰûː) (central)}}

External links

• Photograph of B. officinalis Hemsl.