Showing posts with label anti-inflammatory. liquid-amber. Show all posts
Showing posts with label anti-inflammatory. liquid-amber. Show all posts

Friday, October 24, 2014

Sweet Gum Liquidambar styraciflua Trees Medicinal Uses

By Liliana Usvat
Blog 248-365

Have you planted a tree today?
What about this year?
What about last 10 years.
What about in your life?

Here is an ideea. Plant Liquidambar styraciflua.














 Liquidambar native to warm temperate areas of eastern North America and tropical montane regions of Mexico and Central America. Sweet gum is one of the main valuable forest trees in the southeastern United States, and is a popular ornamental tree intemperate climates. It is recognizable by the combination of its five-pointed star-shaped leaves and its hard, spiked fruits.

This plant's genus name Liquidambar was first given by Linnaeus in 1753 from [the Latinliquidus, fluid, and the Arabic ambar, amber, in allusion to the fragrant terebinthine juice or gum which exudes from the tree. Its specific epithet styraciflua is an old generic name meaning flowing with styrax (a plant resin)

The earliest known published record of Liquidambar styraciflua is in a work by Spanish naturalist Francisco Hernández published posthumously in 1651, in which he describes the species as a large tree producing a fragrant gum resembling liquid amber, whence the genus name Liquidambar. In Ray's Historia Plantarum (1686) it is called Styrax liquida.

Medicinal Uses

The common name for the sweetgum tree's medicinal product is liquid-amber.

When made into a balsam or salve, it is used for 

  • skin conditions, 
  • hemorroids, 
  • ringworm scabies and 
  • frostbite. 
  • Sweetgum salves have a minor antiseptic value, 
  • but work well as an anti-inflammatory. 
  • Taken internally, liquid-amber has stimulant and expectorant effects. 
  • It is also used internally for sore throats, 
  • coughs, 
  • colds, 
  • asthma, 
  • bronchitis, 
  • cystitis, 
  • vaginal discharge,
  • strokes, and is it indicated to 
  • have an effect on some cancers.