Comparative Pharmacognostical Evaluation of Five Different Market Samples of Piper Longum Linn.

Abstract

Pippalimoola (root of Piper longum.linn) is one of  most important drug in Ayurveda used as single drug and in combination with other herbs ,minerals or metallic preparations for poly herbo-mineral formulations.. In Ancient literature we found that in the name of ‘Moola’(means firmly fixed a root) we must practice root but now a days instead of Pippali moola most of market samples are substituted with stem of same plant, so it is essential to check the botanical source of market samples.In this study,different five market samples of Pippalimoola were procured all over India and one sample (control) was collected after authentication of botanical source of plant.Pharmacognostical study was undertaken to observe  morphological characters  of market samples and compared with the collected sample. It was observed that out of five market samples; macroscopic and microscopic characters of one sample was matched with the characters of control root sample. While other four samples were found to be stem of the plant. Hence there is lots of variation in raw material of the plant in Indian market.