Curcuma aeruginosa (PROSEA)

Plant Resources of South-East Asia Introduction

List of species

Curcuma aeruginosa Roxb.

Protologue: Asiat. Res. 11: 335 (1810).

• Indonesia: temu hitam (general), temu ireng (Javanese, Balinese), koneng hideung (Sundanese)
• Malaysia: temu erang, temu hitam (Peninsular)
• Thailand: waan mahaamek (central)
• Vietnam: nghệ ten dồng.

Burma (Myanmar), Vietnam, Cambodia, Thailand, Peninsular Malaysia, Sumatra and Java; cultivated at least in Vietnam, Cambodia, Java and the Moluccas.

In Indo-China rhizomes are used as a medicine for colic. In Peninsular Malaysia they have been prescribed to treat asthma and cough, applied externally to scurvy, and suggested as an application for mental derangement. In Indonesia and Thailand, rhizomes are the chief ingredient of a decoction given to women after childbirth to accelerate the lochia. They are considered to be depurative and used both internally and externally for treating exanthema, and as a poultice to treat itch. Other medicinal applications are against obesity, rheumatism, and as an anthelmintic. During periods of famine the starch extracted from the rhizomes is used as a substitute for cassava or maize. A dye can be obtained from the rhizome.

• A herb with rhizome up to 16 cm long and 3 cm thick, outside grey and shiny, tips pink, inside bluish or blue-green with white cortex.
• Leaf sheaths to 50 cm long, blades elliptical to oblong-lanceolate, 30-80 cm × 9-20 cm, green with wide purplish-brown suffusion on each side of midrib on distal half.
• Inflorescence on a separate shoot, bracts pale green, coma bracts purple.
• Corolla about 4.5 cm long, deep crimson-pink; labellum about 17 mm × 17 mm, pale yellow with deep yellow median band, other staminodes longitudinally folded, pale yellow, anther spurred.

C. aeruginosa is found in grassy places and teak forest, at 400-750 m altitude.

• Burkill, I.H., 1966. A dictionary of the economic products of the Malay Peninsula. Revised reprint. 2 volumes. Ministry of Agriculture and Co operatives, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. Vol. 1 (A-H) pp. 1-1240. Vol. 2 (I- Z) pp. 1241-2444.
• Darwis SN, Madjo Indo, A.B.D. & Hasiyah, S., 1991. Tumbuhan obat famili Zingiberaceae [Medicinal plants of the Zingiberaceae]. Seri Pengembangan No. 17. Pusat Penelitian dan Pengembangan Tanaman Industri, Bogor, Indonesia. 103 pp.
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• Jitoe, A. et al., 1992. Antioxidant activity of tropical ginger extracts and analysis of the contained curcuminoids. Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry 40(8): 1337-1340.
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• Pételot, A., 1952-1954. Les plantes médicinales du Cambodge, du Laos et du Vietnam [The medicinal plants of Cambodia, Laos and Vietnam]. 4 volumes. Centre National de Recherches Scientifiques et Techniques, Saigon, Vietnam.
• Smitinand, T., 1980. Thai plant names. Royal Forest Department, Bangkok, Thailand. 379 pp.
• Valeton, T., 1918. New notes on the Zingiberaceae of Java and the Malayan Archipelago. Bulletin du Jardin Botanique de Buitenzorg, Série II, 27: 1-167.
• van Steenis, C.G.G.J., 1949. Plumbaginaceae. In: van Steenis, C.G.G.J. (General editor): Flora Malesiana. Series 1, Vol. 4. Noordhoff Kolff N.V., Djakarta, Indonesia. pp. 107-112.
• Watanabe, K. et al., 1986. Antiulcer activity of extracts and isolated compounds from Zedoary Gajutsu cultivated in Yakushima, Japan. Yakugaku Zasshi 106(12): 1137-1142. (in Japanese)

• Curcuma (Medicinal plants)

• Trimurti H. Wardini & Budi Prakoso