The Fern That Fights Seizures

The story

In many parts of India, a small water fern called Marsilea minuta was used as a traditional remedy. In Calcutta, chemist Asima Chatterjee wanted to know what was really inside such medicinal plants. In 1944 she became the first woman to earn a Doctor of Science degree from an Indian university, the University of Calcutta, and she spent her career studying the chemistry of Indian plants. Was there a real, measurable reason a fern could help, or was it only belief? The only way to find out was to isolate the plant's chemicals one by one and test what each could do.

The science

Asima Chatterjee's work on Marsilea minuta led to Ayush-56, an anti-epileptic preparation developed in India. Epilepsy causes seizures, sudden bursts of uncontrolled electrical activity in the brain. Medicines that reduce seizures are called anticonvulsants. Finding them in plants is the work of phytochemistry, the chemistry of plants: extracting natural compounds, working out their structures, and testing their effects. This is how a traditional remedy can be checked scientifically.

Try it

Questions students ask