Bio Diversity Park

Common Name : Red sandalwood

Hindi Name : लाल चंदन, रक्तचंदन | Scientific Name : Pterocarpus santalinus
Family : Fabaceae
Uses : It is one of the most reputed and well-accepted plants described in ayurvedic literature and utilized as traditional medicine. A wide array of biological activities and potential health benefits of P. santalinus have been reported, including antioxidative, antidiabetic, antimicrobial, anticancer, and anti-inflammatory properties, and protective effects on the liver, gastric mucosa, and nervous system. All these protective effects were attributed to bioactive compounds present in P. santalinus. The plant has massive medicinal and commercial values due to its red elegant wood for furniture making, handicrafts, and carvings. Heartwood was the primary plant part used for the medicinal purpose and reported to contain polyphenolic compounds, flavonoids, aurones, beside sesquiterpenes while the leaves and bark are enriched with triterpenoids.
Native: Indo-China to Nansei-shoto and West Pacific.
General Description:

It is a deciduous tree and grows primarily in the seasonally dry tropical biome. The tree is of moderate size having very hard dark purple heart-wood, and it is bitter in flavour. Its bark thickness is 1–1.5 cm and intensely split into quadrangular plates by deep vertical and horizontal cracks and is blackish-brown in color. There are many pink streaks in pale yellow blaze discharge plentiful red sticky thick gum. Branchlets are flabby and without hair. Leaves are 10–18 cm long, tri-foliated, and rachis is swollen at the base. Usually, leaflets are three in number (infrequently more than 3), broadly ball-shaped. The leaf base is slightly heart-shaped while the apex is deeply notched. The margin of leaves is shiny, without hair, leathery and entire. Flowers are aromatic, yellow in color, about 2 cm long, bisexual, stalked in auxiliary simple or sparingly branched racemes. Pods are flat ring or disc-shaped about 5 × 4.5 cm comprising the wing and slowly tapers into a small tip about 1-cm long. The number of seeds per pod is one hardly two, smooth, kidney-shaped, and 1–1.5 long and are reddish-brown.