PHARMACOGNOSTIC INSIGHTS AND THERAPEUTIC POTENTIAL OF CURCUMA LONGA LEAVES WITH A FOCUS ON ANTI-INFLAMMATORY PROPERTIES

Curcuma longa (turmeric) has been known to have therapeutic properties as far back as history can tell, but little is known about the therapeutic properties of the leaves apart from the rhizomes.To the best of our knowledge, this review is the first to examine the pharmacognostic characteristics and anti-inflammatory effects of Curcuma longa leaves.Our mission is to promote the utilization of this botanical resource which is currently under-utilized through generating a link between the traditional utilization of the plant and the current pharmaceutical utilization.Sesquiterpenes, alkaloids, tannins and flavonoids are the phytochemical properties that determine the macro-morphological and micromorphological properties of Curcuma longa leaves.The anti-inflammatory activity of these bioactive compounds that belong to a different group than the rhizomes' ones helps to support and expand the uses of the plant in therapy.There is the prospect that, in the management of chronic inflammation, mechanistic studies have demonstrated the capacity of phytochemicals extracted from leaves to influence key inflammatory processes, including the suppression of NF-B, and the decrease of prostaglandins.The review investigates new approaches where ethnopharmacological approaches are synthesized with conventional science including areas such as nanoparticles-bearing leaf extracts and polyherbalials with synergistic actions.Nevertheless, these improvements have been offset by major drawbacks in the regulation and clinical accreditation of Curcuma longa leaves in conventional medicine systems.For this reason, this review presents Curcuma longa leaves as a suitable and effective option for the extension and enhancement of natural medicine instead of conventional non-steroidal antiinflammatory drugs.Ideally, we should be dreaming about how this beloved plant can be utilized to better serve our medicinal purposes.