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Sinopodophyllum is a herbaceous perennial plant in the family Berberidaceae, described as a genus in 1979. It includes only one known species, Sinopodophyllum hexandrum, native to Afghanistan, Bhutan, northern India, Kashmir, Nepal, Pakistan, and western China (Gansu, Qinghai, Shaanxi, Sichuan, Tibet, Yunnan). Common names include Himalayan may apple and Indian may apple.
Sinopodophyllum hexandrum grows across the Himalayan region, east to Afghanistan, and north to Southwest China. It is reasonably abundant in the Great Himalayan National Park of Himachal Pradesh. In the fringes of the Valley of Flowers National Park, the plant's density is about one individual per square meter according to a study by C.P. Kala.
The root and rhizome of the plant are poisonous, but used traditionally for medicine. They are composed of aryltetralin lignans that have anticancer, antifungal, and immunomodulatory properties. The rhizome of the plant also contains a resin, known generally and commercially as Indian Podophyllum Resin, which can be processed to extract podophyllin (podophyllotoxin), a neurotoxin. Rhizomes contain up to 15% podophyllin. In carefully administered doses, the resin can be applied topically to treat genital warts.
Text excerpted from the Wikipedia article Sinopodophyllum by its contributors, under CC BY-SA 4.0; the excerpts are shared under the same licence.
