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Ethnobotanical Aspects of Some Traditional Medicinal Plants

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Medically Important Plant Biomes: Source of Secondary Metabolites

Part of the book series: Microorganisms for Sustainability ((MICRO,volume 15))

Abstract

Ethnobotany (study of usage of plant parts for human health) is considered to be a part of Economic Botany, which emphasizes on the economic utilization of plants for human welfare. Biological diversity is universally recognized as an important part of the world’s natural heritage and an essential component for the sustainability of global ecosystems. In the current era, modern allopathic medicines are very fast effective and have over-ridden the traditional herbal remedies. Additionally, the diversity of traditional medicinal plants is facing a continuous decline due to a number of natural and anthropogenic activities including the clear-cutting of forests, conversion of grasslands into cultivated lands, industrialization, overgrazing, soil erosion, desertification, etc. Similarly, overexploitation also poses a severe threat to diversity of medicinal plants and has led to decline severely a number of species. It should be recognized that plant diversity has a commendable importance as a source of pharmaceutically active substances. In this chapter, the medicinal value and usage of various medicinal plants typically used in traditional medicine have been discussed.

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Acknowledgment

This book chapter has been extracted form “Review of Literature” section presented in the Ph.D. thesis of Iftikhar Ahmad (89-ag-1513) submitted to University of Agriculture, Faisalabad in 2008. A partial material has also been drawn from the article “WORLD IS TURNING BACK TO NATURAL MEDICINES: Past, present and future of medicinal plants” published as a new article by the same author(s).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Botany Sciences, University of Sargodha, Sargodha, Pakistan

    Iftikhar Ahmad

  2. Department of Botany, University of Agriculture, Faisalabad, Pakistan

    Muhammad Sajid Aqeel Ahmad, Mumtaz Hussain & Mansoor Hameed

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  1. Iftikhar Ahmad
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  2. Muhammad Sajid Aqeel Ahmad
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  3. Mumtaz Hussain
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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Faculty of Biology, National University of Uzbekistan, Tashkent, Uzbekistan

    Dilfuza Egamberdieva

  2. Department for the Innovation on Biological, Agrofood and Forestal systems (DIBAF), Laboratoy of Plant Cytology and Biotechnology, Tuscia University, Viterbo, Vatican City State

    Antonio Tiezzi

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Ahmad, I., Ahmad, M.S.A., Hussain, M., Hameed, M. (2019). Ethnobotanical Aspects of Some Traditional Medicinal Plants. In: Egamberdieva, D., Tiezzi, A. (eds) Medically Important Plant Biomes: Source of Secondary Metabolites. Microorganisms for Sustainability, vol 15. Springer, Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-13-9566-6_1

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