INTRODUCTION:

Acacia species are commonly known as ‘Babool’ inIndia. It is widely used for the treatment of various diseases and disorders like in skin, sexual disorders, stomach and tooth problems etc in human beings as well as in animals. Acacia nilotica tree has been recognized worldwide as a multipurpose tree. It is widely distributed throughout dry and semi- dry zones of the world including India.^[1-6]

The World Health Organization (WHO) has listed more than 21,000 plants, which are used for a lot of therapeutic purposes all over the world ^[7]. They observed that about 74% of 119 plant-derived pharmaceutical medicines are used in recent medicine. It also estimates that 4 billion people presently use herbal medicine for health care.^[8]

More than hundreds years, herbal compoundsobtained from medicinal plants, minerals and organic matter is still the foundation of about 75–80% of the world’s population for health care marketed and gaining popularity in developed and developing countries^[9]. Herbs have contains different active principles like alkaloids, volatile essential oils, glycosides, resins, oleoresins, steroids, tannins, terpenes and phenols ^[10]. In the last few years there is an exponential growth in the field of herbal medicine because of their natural origin, easy availability, efficacy, safety and less side effects with efficient to cure age-related disorders like memory loss, osteoporosis, immune disorders, etc. for which no modern medicine is available.^{[11, 12]}

Medicinal plant researchers pursued with several goals like the development of low cost therapeutic compounds and the discovery of prototypic drugs^[13]. Acacia nilotica is also known as Gum Arabic tree, Babul, Egyptian thorn, or Prickly Acacia is multipurpose nitrogen fixing tree legume. It occurs from sea level to over 2000mts and withstand at extreme temperature and air dryness but sensitive to frost when it is young ^[14]. It is widely spread in subtropical and tropical Africa from Egypt to South Africa, and in Asia.^{[15, 16]}

DESCRIPTION:^[17-21]

Taxonomy:

Kingdom: Plantae

Subkingdom: Tracheobionta

Super division: Spermatophyta

Division: Magnoliophyta

Class: Magnoliopsida

Subclass: Rosidae

Order: Fabales

Family: Fabaceae

Genus: Acacia

Species: Nilotica

COMMON NAMES:^[17-21]

Acacia Gomifera, Acacia De Cayenne,Acacia À Gomme, ArabischeGummiakazie, Babul, Babul Acacia, Black Piquant, Casha, Cassie, Egyptian Acacia, Goma Arabica, Gommier Rouge, Gum Arabic Tree, Indian Gum-Arabic-Tree, Gum Arabic Tree, Thorn-Mimosa, Thorny Acacia.

INDIAN NAMES:^[17-21]

Bengali: Babla, Babul.

Gujrathi: Babaria, baval, Kaloabaval.

Hindi: Babul, Kikar.

Kannad: Gobbli, Karijali.

Malyalam: Karivelan, Karuvelum.

Marathi: Babhul, Vedibabul.

Orisa: Bambuda, Baubra.

Punjabi: Sak.

Tamil: Kaluvelamaram, Karuvelam.

Telgu: Nallatumma, Tuma.

DISTRIBUTION:

TheAcacia nilotica tree found in all over the world lifeIndia, Algeria, Angola, Botswana, Egypt, Ethiopia, Gambia, Ghana, Kenya, Libya, Mali, Nigeria, Senegal, Somalia, in South Africa-Sudan, Tanzania, Uganda, Zambia, Zimbabwe, Oman, Saudi Arabia, Yemen, Iran, Iraq, Israel, Syria, Nepal, Pakistan etc^[22].

PLANT DESCRIPTION:

Acacia nilotica is a single stemmed plant, grows to 15-18 m in height and 2-3 m in diameter.

Pods and Seeds:

Pods are 7-15 cm long, green (when immature) or greenish black (when mature), indehiscent, deeply constricted between the seed giving a necklace appearance. Seeds are 8-12 per pod, compressed andovoid.^[23]

Leaves:

The leaves are bipinnate, pinnate 3-10 pairs, 1.3-3.8 cm long, leaflets 10-20 pairs, and 2-5mm long.^[24]

Flowers:

Flowers are globular heads, 1.2-1.5 cm in diameter of a bright golden yellow colour.

Stem: Stems are usually dark to black coloured, deep longitudinal fissured, grey-pinkish slash, exuding a reddishgum.^[25]

Bark:

The colour of bark is orange and/or green (young tree), but older trees have dark, rough bark and tend to lose their thorns.^[26]

Thorns:

Thorns are thin, straight, light grey exist in axillary pairs (usually 3-12), 5-7.5 cm long in young trees.

Root: Root is brown colour in older and whitish in younger regions.

Gum:

The gum varies in colour from very pale yellowish brown to dark reddish brown depending on the quantity of tannins in the sample.^[27]

Acacia nilotica Plant

Acacia nilotica Fruits

GROWTH PATTERN AND GERMINATION:

Acacia nilotica is a tropical species found throughout India and occurs from sea-level to over 2000 m altitude. Prickly Acacia germinates in rainfall in the wet season. But some seeds may still germinate up to 15 years after seed drop. Seedlings grow rapidly near water but more slowly in open grasslands. It grows in average annual temperatures range from 15–28°C, being frost sensitive when young and withstanding daily maximum temperatures of 50°C.^[28]The mean maximum temperature of the hottest month is 25–42ºC and the mean minimum temperature of the coldest month 6–23°C. Babul plant prefers dry conditions. This subspecies is commonly found on soils with high clay content, but may grow on deep sandy loam in areas of higher rainfall. It commonly grows close to waterways on seasonally flooded river flats and tolerates salinity well.^[29] Trees can flower and fruit two to three years after germination, but after high rainfall it is more quickly, usually between March and June.^[30]Pods are formed between July and December. Most leaf fall between June and November and seed pods drop during October to January.^[31] Seeds are very simple. Inner integument degenerates completely and the testa is formed by the outer integument.^{[32, 33]}

CHEMICAL CONSTITUENTS:

Acacia species contains amines and alkaloids, glycosides, fatty acids and seed oils, fluoroacetate, gums, nonprotein amino acids, terpenes, diterpenes, phytosterol and triterpene, saponins, hydrolyzable tannins, flavonoids and condensed tannins.^[34] The plant is richer source of cystine, methionine, threonine, lysine, tryptophan, potassium, phosphorus, magnesium, iron and manganese.^[35]The plant chemical compounds include diester, pentacosane dioic acid dihexadecyl ester andheptacosane 1, 2, 3-triol^[36]

Seeds:

It contain phenolic compounds which consisting of m-digallic acid, gallic acid, protocatechuic and ellagic acids, leucocyanidin, m-digallic dimer 3,4,5,7-tetrahydroxy flavan-3-ol, oligomer 3,4,7-trihydroxy flavan 3,4-diol and 3,4,5,7-tetrahydroxy flavan-3-ol and (-) epicatechol. The mature seed also contains crude protein, crude fibre, crude fat, carbohydrates.

Fruit:

also contains mucilage and saponins.^{[37, 38]}

Pods: It contains gallic acid and condensed tannins.

Leaf:

It contain apigenin, 6-8-bis-D-glucoside, rutin, 8% digestive protein.

Relative levels of tannin in different parts of plant is, deseeded pods (50%), leaves (7.6%), bark (13.5%) and twigs (15.8%).

Bark:

It contains tannin (12-20%), terpenoids, saponins and glycosides, Phlobetannin, gallic acid, protocatechuic acid pyrocatechol.^[39]

Root:

It contains octaconsanol, betulin, B-amyrin and B-sitosterol.

Gum:

It is composed of galactoaraban.

TRADITIONAL UTILITIES:

Acacia nilotica is a pioneer species and is economically used as a source of tannins, gums, timber, fuel and fodder.^{[40, 41]}

Babul plant is therapeutic used as anti-cancer, astringent, anti-oxidant, natriuretic, antispasmodial, diuretic, in intestinal pains and diarrhea, nerve stimulant, in cold, congestion, coughs, fever, hemorrhages, leucorrhea, ophthalmia and sclerosis.^[42]

Seed:

Seeds have antimalarial, antidiabetic, antihypertensive and antispasmodic activities.

Leaves and Pod:

The leaves and pods are used as antiinflammatory agents. The pods have molluscicidal and algicidal properties.

Bark:

It is used in the treatment of hemorrhages, cold, diarrhea, tuberculosis and leprosy.

Root:

It is used as an aphrodisiac and the flowers for treating syphilis lesions.

Gum:

Gum obtains from the tree is pharmaceutically used as suspending and emulsifying agent and in preparation of many formulations. Its resins repel insects and water.^[42]

ETHNOPHARMACOLOGICAL CLAIMS:

1. Antimicrobial Activity^[43]

2. Antibacterial Activity^[44]

3. Antifungal activity and Antiviral activity^[45,
46]

4. Antibiotic activity^[47]

5. Anti-Diarrhea Activity^[48]

6. Antioxidant Activity^[49]

7. Spasmogenic activity and Antispasmodial activity^[50]

8. Molluscicidal properties^[51]

9. Antihypertensive activity and Vasoconstriction activity^[52]

10. Anti-mutagenic activity^[3]

11. Cytotoxic activity and Anti-hepetocarcinogenic activity^[53]

12. Anthelmintic, Analgesic and Anti-inflammatory activity^[54]

13. Milk production^[55]

14. Antiplatelet Aggregatory & Anti-quorum sensing Activity^{[56, 57]}

15. Antidiabetic^[58]

CONCLUSION:

In the present comprehensive review, we referred primary and secondary data to compile the information based on taxonomy, origin, distribution, description, phytoconstituents, traditional and pharmacological claims on Acacia nilotica (L.). Traditionally the plant used widely for the treatment of various ailments, but scientifically few of them was screened out. Thus the scientific studies should be conducted to investigate the unexploited potential of Acacia nilotica (L).

CONFLICT OF INTEREST:

Nil

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Received on 24.07.2018 Accepted on 07.08.2018

Asian J. Pharm. Res. 2018; 8(3): 170-174.

DOI: 10.5958/2231-5691.2018.00030.8