Aloe vera

Aloe vera

Local name: ঘৃতকুমারী (‘Ghritokumari’)

Scientific name: Aloe vera (L) Burm.f

Taxonomic Position Aaccording to Cronquist (1988)

Botanical Description

Habit: A xerophytic perennial herb, succulent stem short, thick, triangular or srear-like.

Figure: A Field view of Aloe vera

Leaf: Sessile, crowded, numerous, 30-60 cm long, narrowly lanceolate, upper surface grey-green to pale green with few too many spots, lower surface generally lighter, spiny toothed at the margins.

Figure: A Tiller of Aloe vera

Inflorescence: A raceme, simple or sparsely branched, 30-60 X 5-6 cm.

Flower: Shortly pedicelled, bisexual actinomorphic, hypogynous, bracts carious. perianth orange or red, tubular, segment somewhat recurved, about as long as the tube. Stamens 6, equalling the perianth, filaments slender, anther dorsifixed. Ovary superior, trilocular, with many ovules in each cell, style filiform, stigma capitate.

Fruit: A capsule somewhat elongated. Flowering and fruiting: September to December.

Economic uses: The clear mucilaginous juice contained in the leaves is a remarkably effective healer of wounds and burns. The concentrated juice, called aloe, is a cathartic, and is taken mainly to relieve constipation and in the treatment of jaundice, loss of appetite., gas formation in the stomach, leucorrhoea, menstrual suppression, burning during sexual ejaculation, piles, rectal fissures, inflammations, ulcers, wounds, various, skin diseases, burns and scalds. It has also been stimulate hair growth.