Trapa natans L.: A Journey from Traditional to Contemporary Therapies - A Review

Abstract: Trapa natans (Family: Trapacea) is an edible and ornate plant in warm, temperate regions of Asia and Europe. Extracts of different parts, as well as the whole herb itself, have traditionally been used to treat many ailments. Current review aims at documenting, finding research gaps, and critically appraising the contemporary information on T. natans based on botanical account, traditional use, reported bioactive constituents, toxicity, and therapeutic activities. We used several electronic databases, including scientific data from Pubmed, and Google scholar up to April 3, 2022, incorporating keywords- “Trapa natans” and “Traditional use of Trapa natans”. The result suggested: (a) The plant is used traditionally for treating burning sensation, dipsia, dyspepsia, haemorrhage, diarrhoea, dysentery, leprosy, weariness, inflammation, fractures, pharyngitis, urethrorrhea, bronchitis, and general debility. (b) The phytoconstituents found in the plant include cycloucalenol, ursolic acid, ellagic acid, chlorogenic acid, gallic acid, syringic acid, quercetin and 2, 3, 23-trihydroxy urs-12-en-28-oic acid. The other phytoconstituents were protein, carbohydrates, starch, flavonoids, and essential vitamins like riboflavin, thiamine, pyridoxine, pantothenic acid, nicotinic acid, vitamin A, vitamin C and D-amylase. (c) The plant was studied further for its pharmacological activity in antidiabetic properties, antimicrobial potency, anti-inflammatory activity, analgesic activity, immunomodulatory effect, antiulcer activity, anticancer property and nootropic activity. (d) Starch obtained from T. natans was also found to have good freeze-thaw properties, metal chelation properties and youghurt stability which could be used for pharmaceutical preparations. (e) The acute oral toxicity of hydroalcoholic, ethanolic and methanolic extracts of T. natans was reported to be safe up to a dose of 2000 mg/Kg. The present review suggests that T. natans needs to be explored for evaluation of mechanistic study of the reported activities, preclinical investigations, and evaluation of clinical studies on humans for its pharmacokinetics and pharmacodynamic actions as well as the development of dose-dependent formulations and routes of administration.