Pharmacognostical Evaluation of Leucas aspera Link.

Leucas aspera Link. (Lamiaceae) is an important medicinal plant in indigenous systems of medicine in India and commonly known as 'Thumbai'. It has various ethnomedicinal values as various traditional communities find diverse medicinal properties. It is used as antipyretic, stimulant, expectorant and diaphoretic drug. The present communication deals with the detailed pharmacognostical evaluation of whole plant of L. aspera collected from five different geographical zones of the country-Uttar Pradesh, Orissa, Karnataka, West Bengal and Gujarat. The botanical characters and TLC fingerprint profile of all the samples were quite similar but some variations were observed in physicochemical parameters. However, some microscopical characters and TLC profile can be used as diagnostic characters for identification of L. aspera, for example amphistomachic leaves and two types of trichomes-abundant, non glandular, uniseriate, 1-3 celled and few glandular, 2-5 celled stalk with rounded tip. Presence of some components at $R_fs-0.56$, 0.65 and 0.76 under UV 366 and at $R_fs-0.31$, 0.43, 0.60, 0.76 and 0.82 under visible light after derivetization in TLC profile may also be used as diagnostic character.