Achyranthes aspera (common names: chaff-flower, prickly chaff flower,Flowers of India devil's horsewhip, Sanskrit: अपामार्ग apāmārga) is a species of plant in the family Amaranthaceae. It is distributed throughout the tropical world.Flora of North America It can be found in many places growing as an introduced species and a common weed. It is an invasive species in some areas, including many Pacific Islands environments.Pacific Islands Ecosystems at Risk
Description Habit: a wild, perennial, erect herb. Stem: herbaceous but woody below, erect, branched, cylindrical, solid, angular, hairy, longitudinally striated, nodes and internodes are prominent, green but violet or pink at nodes. Leaves: ramal and cauline, simple, exstipulate, opposite decussate, petiolate, ovate or obovate, entire, acute or acuminate, hairy all over, unicostate reticulate. Inflorescence: a spike with reflexed flowers arranged on long peduncle. Flowers: bracteate, bracteolate, bracteoles two, shorter than perianth, dry, membranous and persistent, sessile, complete, hermaphrodite, actinomorphic, pentamerous, hypogynous, small, spinescent, green. Bracts: ovate, persistent, awned. Perianth: made up of 5 tepals, polyphyllous, imbricate or quincuncial, green, ovate to oblong, persistent. Androecium: made up of 10 stamens, out of which 5 are fertile and 5 are scale-like, fimbriated, sterile staminodes, both alternating with each other, fertile stamens are antiphyllous, monadelphous, filaments slightly fused at the base, dithecous, dorsifixed or versatile, introrse. Gynoecium: it is bicarpellary, syncarpous, superior, unilocular, ovule one, basal placentation, style single and filiform, stigma capitate. Fruits: oblong utricle Seeds: endospermic with curved embryo, 2 mm long, oblong black. Flowering and Fruiting time: September to April
Uses The juice of this plant is a potent ingredient for a mixture of wall plaster, according to the Samarāṅgaṇa Sūtradhāra, which is a Sanskrit treatise dealing with Śilpaśāstra (Hindu precepts of art and construction).
Traditional medicine In the Caribbean region during the 20th century, A. aspera was used in traditional medicine as a decoction tea of boiled leaves and roots.
Chemical constituents Achyranthes aspera contains triterpenoid saponins which possess oleanolic acid as the aglycone. Ecdysterone, an insect moulting hormone, and long chain alcohols are also found in Achyranthes aspera.Indian Herbal Pharmacopia Vol. II, Page-5.
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