Revista CENIC. Ciencias Biológicas ISSN: 0253-5688 [email protected] Centro Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas Cuba

Wisniak, Jaime GUSTAVE PLANCHON Revista CENIC. Ciencias Biológicas, vol. 46, núm. 3, septiembre-diciembre, 2015, pp. 270 -284 Centro Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas Ciudad de La Habana, Cuba

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GUSTAVE PLANCHON

Jaime Wisniak

Department of Chemical Engineering, Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, Beer-Sheva, Israel 84105 [email protected]

Recibido: 15 de febrero de 2015. Aceptado: 16 de marzo de 2015.

Palabras clave: botánica, elemi, geobotánica, globularias, jaborandi, farmacia, quinquinas, Strichnos, tufas. Key words: , elemi, geobotany, globularias, jaborandi, pharmacy, quinquinas, Strychnos, tufas.

RESUMEN. Gustave Planchon (1833-1900), médico, farmacéutico y botánico francés promotor de la enseñanza de farmacia en Francia, realizó investigaciones en zoología, botánica, geobotánica, fitopaleontología, fisiología vegetal, medicamentos, e historia de la farmacia. Sus principales publicaciones se centraron en las globularias, quinquinas, Strychnos, y descripción detallada de la estructura de los diferentes órganos de plantas y árboles.

ABSTRACT. Gustave Planchon (1833-1900), French physician, pharmacist, and botanist, promoter of the teaching of pharmacy in , carried on research in zoology, botany, geobotany, phytopaleontology, physiology, drugs, and history of pharmacy. His main publications were related to the globularias, quinquinas, Strychnos, and a detailed description of the structure of the different organs of and trees.

Life and career1,2

Fig 1: Gustave Planchon (1833-1900).

Gustave Planchon (Figure 1) was born on October 19, 1833, in Ganges, Hérault, the son of David Planchon, a modest candle manufacturer, and Marie Coularou (Figure 2). After finishing his basic education he enrolled at the Faculté de Médicine de , where for three consecutive years he won the first scholastic place. He graduated in 1859 after successfully defending a thesis about the globularia.3 The following year he was appointed agrégé at the Faculty after wining the competitive aggregation examination with a work about the quinquinas.4 This position opened him the possibility of an academic teaching and research career. In 1860 he was appointed professeur agrégé à la Faculté de médecine de Montpellier and professor of botany by the Faculté des Sciences de l’Académie de Lausanne, he position he kept for two years (1860-1862). After his 270

Revista CENIC Ciencias Biológicas, Vol. 46, No. 3, pp. 285-284, septiembre-diciembre, 2015. return to France he earned his degrees of docteur-ès-Sciences naturelles [after defending two theses, one about the geological and paleontological characteristics of the tufas of the quaternary period of Montpellier, and the second about the changes in the flora of Montpellier, from the 16th century on],5,6 and of pharmacien de 1ère classe [after defending a thesis about the Kermes vermilio].7

Fig 2. Birth certificate of Gustave Planchon.

In the same year he was appointed agrégé at the École Supérieure de Pharmacie de Montpellier. On November 6, 1862, he married Eugénie Victorine Eglé Leenhardt (1837-1890), the daughter of Marc Antoine Eugène Leenhardt (1796-1868) and Marguerite Emilie Dessale (1800-1862). They had one son, Eugène Edouard Planchon (1863-1931). In 1866 he was appointed to the chair of natural history of medicines, replacing Nicolas-Jean-Baptiste-Gaston Guibourt (1790-1867) 271

Revista CENIC Ciencias Biológicas, Vol. 46, No. 3, pp. 285-284, septiembre-diciembre, 2015. who had just retired. In 1866 he was appointed director of the Ecole supérieure de pharmacie of , a position he occupied until his death in Montpellier on April 13, 1900.1,2 Planchon’s research activities were mostly in the areas botany and its history, plant physiology, the structure of medicinal plants, pharmacology, and phytopaleontology. In 1876 he published a revised edition of Guibourt’ famous treatise Histoire naturelle des drogues simples8, which he enriched with the results of his thesis about the quinquinas.9

Honors and awards Planchon received many awards and honors for his contributions to science and technology, among them: Laureate of the Faculté de Médecine de Montpellier for three consecutive years (1854-1856) and of the Institut (1877); recipient of the Hanbury Gold Medal (1888); member of the Société de Botanique et d’Horticulture de l’Hérault (1862), member of the Société de Pharmacie de Paris (1868), twice its president (1875, 1900) and general secretary between 1876- 1900, member of the Société Botanique de France (1867), of the Société Philomatique (1869), of the Société des Sciences Naturalles de Cherbourg (1871), of the Société Impériale des Naturalistes of Moscow, of the Royal Society of Botany of London (1897), and of the Institut de Genève; corresponding member of the Philadelphia College of Pharmacy (1870), of the Société Royale des Sciences Médicales et Naturelles de Bruxelles (1919), and of Société Royale de Médicine de Bruxelles; honorary member of Société de Pharmaciens de Constantine, of the British Society of Pharmacy, of the American Pharmaceutical Association; appointed chevalier of the Légion d’Honneur (1881) (Figure 3), and promoted to officier in 1898, etc.

Fig 3. Appointment to the Légion d'Honneur.

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Scientific contribution Planchon wrote over 100 papers, booklets, and books4-7, 9-16 about his research activities in the subjects of zoology, botany, geobotany, phytopaleontology, plant physiology, drugs, the history of pharmacy, etc. Many of his papers were devoted exclusively to a description of the tissue structure of the different organs of a particular group of plants; these will not be discussed here. As customary for all candidates to the Académie des Sciences, Planchon published booklets describing his researches and achievements.17,18

Globulariæ As mentioned above, Planchon’s thesis for obtaining his medical degree was related to the globularias from a botanical and medical viewpoint.3 In the first part, exclusively devoted to the botanical knowledge about the shrub, he wrote that although the botanists of the 16th century already knew almost all of the Globularia species, they designated it under a variety of different names, such as Bellis, Thymelœa, Scabiosa, Alypum, Empetron, and Hippoglossum. Eventually John Pitton de Tournefort (1656-1708) reunited all of them under the name Globularia Linn. Planchon, after analyzing the botanical affinities of the Globularia, agreed with the opinion of the botanist John Lindley (1799-1865) in placing it in the natural order Selaginaceæ,19 although Lindley had not justified his recommendation. Guibourt had explained that the Globulariæ was a small family formed by the genus Globularia, native to central and southern Europe. One of the better-known species was the globularia turbith (Globularia alypium), a shrub about 60 to 100 cm high, growing in southern France and regarded as a drastic purgative by the physicians of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries (for this reason it was also named Frutex terrible).8 The second part of Planchon’s thesis was devoted completely to a detailed botanical description of Globularia Alypum and the results of his experiments to determine its true medical properties. Planchon mentioned that in 1819 the French physician Jean-Louis-Auguste Loiseleur- Deslongchamps (1774-1849) had conducted experiments on 24 patients and found that the leaves of the shrub were a mild laxative and not a strong purgative as reported in many sources.20 For some unknown reasons the results of Loiseleur-Deslongchamps, although quoted in many important medical books, went unused and the shrub continued to be considered a dangerous medicine. Planchon could not understand the reason for this situation and decided to conduct a series of additional experiments, first on himself, and then in the Saint-Éloi hospital in Montpellier), under the direction of professor Dupré. The leaves were used to prepare a decoction or an extract, or used in powder form. The results of all these experiments (24 in number) proved unequivocally that the leaves of Globularia Alypum acted as a safe, mild and efficient purgative, without the griping properties of senna, and without leaving behind a tendency to constipate like rhubarb. The best form was a decoction made by boiling 30 g of the leaves in about one glass of water for 10 to 15 minutes. The yellow-brown solution was filtered and sweetened with sugar or with honey. This quantity constituted a dose; it was quite bitter but not nauseous; it usually acted in about two hours, producing on an average four evacuations.3

Tufas of Montpellier In the introduction to his doctoral theses, Planchon explained that although both seemed to have very different titles, in practice they complemented each other, Both addressed the same problem, one explored the state of the Montpellier vegetation before the probable intervention of man, and the other, the modifications, which the flora underwent during a specific historical period.5,6 The first part of the thesis on the calcareous tufas of Montpellier was devoted to the geological description of the nature, extent, and location of the tufas, and a description of the different theories proposed about their formation and period by scientists such as de Philippe Laurent de Joubert (1729-1792), Marcel de Serres (1780-1862), Jean Marie Taupenot (1822-1856), Paul Gervaise de Rouville (1823-1907), etc. For example, de Serres believed that the formation of tufas 273

Revista CENIC Ciencias Biológicas, Vol. 46, No. 3, pp. 285-284, septiembre-diciembre, 2015. represented the last deposit of this nature occurring on the earth because it covered all the other layers and was layered by alluvial material. De Rouville did not share this opinion; he thought the tufa was actually covered by the ferruginous deposits that accompanied alpine deposits. The area examined was the valley of the Lez, which contained the main watercourses of the neighboring country. This space was occupied by two geological zones of different age: The most southern one had been deposited under the waters of a tertiary sea; the other was composed essentially of Jurassic land, surrounding a water formation representing the lower tertiary. An important observation was that most of the water streams and cascades were highly loaded with carbonates; as a result, the leaves carried on by the waters or the winds, were stopped by the walls of the waterfalls and rapidly became covered by limestone; they simultaneously experimented a kind of maceration that destroyed most of their parenchyma and highlighted the details of their skeleton.5 Planchon went on to describe the tufas present in Martinet, Lavalette, Clapiès, Monteferrier, Fontecouverte, and Boutonnet, their relation with the surrounding terrains, and the animal and vegetable fossils they contained. He wrote that shells of terrestrial and freshwater mollusks mostly characterized the animal fossils, among them, Lymœus ovatus, Cyclas fontinalis, Succinea amphibian, Helix variabilis, Helix limbata, and Helix striata. In an Appendix, he reported the finding of a Phryganide of the genus Rhyacophila, the larva of which had left serrifom tubular incrustations, which had been wrongly assumed to be impressions of roots. He suggested naming this new species Rhyacophila toficola.5 Stems, leaves, flowers, and fruits constituted the vegetable fossils, they had left their imprint but their tissues had disappeared completely, without petrification. Planchon gave a short general description of these imprints and then enumerated the 30 species of plants he had identified, among them, Clematis vitalba, Viti vinifera, Ilex aquifolium, Rubia peregrina, Phillyrea angustifolia, Laurus nobilis, Ficus carica, Ulmus camprestris, and Quercus ilex.5 In his conclusions, Planchon refuted the theory of Taupenot that these tufas were deposited at the bottom of an ancient lake. He believed that they were a consequence of the local water sources being charged with carbonates; these waters rose in the valley and progressively covered the mosses, leaves, or other remains which grew or became detained in their path. He remarked that most of plants (21 out of 30) living at the time of the tufa period were still living and abundant in the Montpellier area, among them the common fig and vine. The individuals of these species found in modern times in cultivated fields were probably the same indigenous species. The absence of the olive tree in the tufas of Montpellier indicated that this species, characteristic of the Mediterranean region, did not originate spontaneously in Montpellier.5

Flora of Montpellier The subject of the second doctoral thesis was a study of the modifications experimented by the flora of Montpellier from the 16th century to the present time (1864).6 In the introduction, Planchon wrote that he and his brother Jules Émile (1823-1888) had assembled all the material available about the important periods of the botanic history of Montpellier. These gave a picture of the explorations and discoveries conducted by many scientists, as well as providing a general view of the different periods transversed by the vegetation. This comparison allowed to notice the disappearance of old species and the introduction of new ones, the results and comparison of the naturalization processes, the analysis of the causes that led to the destruction of a given type, etc. In the introduction of his thesis, Planchon gave a short description of the work done by many eminent botanists, from the 16th century on, such as Guillaume Rondelet (1507-1566), François Rabelais (1493-1553), Jacques Dalechamp (1513-1588), (1526-1609), Pierre Pena (1535-1605), Mathias de Lobel (1538-1616), Augustin Pyramus de Candolle (1778-1841), Dominique Alexander Godron (1807-1880), and Charles Martins (1806-1889), and mentioned that their work had led to the establishment of the Jardin des Plantes and publication of many historical treatises about the flora of the region.6 274

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The following chapter was devoted to the analysis of the causes, which led to the modification of a particular flora region, particularly destruction and dispersion. Planchon mentioned that similar causes served explaining effects apparently opposed. Those favoring extension of new species created simultaneously an unfavorable situation for the indigenous ones, which could lead to their destruction. Cultivations that prepared the soil for the foreign species fought an active battle against the plants of the region and slowly chased them out of their natural environment. It was difficult to extirpate a natural plant well established; if it occupied a small part of the area available it would always find the most convenient locations to thrive. According to Planchon, the effects of cultivation, clearing, and even the rapacity of botanists and dealers, was not as serious as commonly assumed. As an example he mentioned that these causes had eliminated only six plants from the Montpellier area (Arum, arisarum, Lupinus luteus, Lupinus varius, Clematic recta, and Coronilla juncea) since the 16th century.6 This was not the situation when a particular species occupied a restricted region, such as Montpellier’s immediate surroundings; vines and olive trees had replaced the prairies; forests laurels, hazel, gooseberry, yellow flowered garlic, etc., had almost completely disappeared and taken refuge in the mountainous areas. Planchon finally referred to another cause of destruction, independent of human action: the action slow but sure of the thousand, often-inappreciable modifications, by which nature gradually substituted new species for the old ones. This succession of vegetable forms, in one and the same region, was a well-established law and without going back to geological periods, where it presented itself to us on an immense scale, we could recognize its effects in the present period.6 According to Planchon, the causes of dispersion were more numerous and diverse than those of destruction and could be classified in three categories: (1) physical causes, such as movements of water and atmosphere, sea or sweet water currents, and winds. These factors could hardly be significant in a limited and enclosed region as the one studied in the thesis. The only new species, which Planchon thought could possible have been introduced by these means was the Erigeron canadensis, which the winds had probably brought into the region from other parts of France; (2) animal action, a well-known factor for transporting the seeds and depositing them in an environment appropriate for their development; and (3) human activity.6 Human activity was the most important cause for dispersion; its effects could be seen everywhere: it had cleared extensive regions; it had populated them with plants foreign to the region, and had protected them against the attack by native plants. Planchon mentioned that botanists had historically practiced purposed introduction since the old times, mostly in private or public gardens. The imported seeds were usually accompanied by impurities, leading the dispersion of additional species. This was a common situation in mills where the undesired seeds were separated and discarded as worthless in the surrounding area. Planchon mentioned that the Port Juvenal ground was known for the exotic character of its flora, originating from the numerous seeds accompanying the imported wool. This wool was washed and put to dry in the surrounding fields, where it dropped its seeds on the soil and generated the imported flora. A census carried on in 1857 indicated the presence of 458 different plants originating from diverse regions of Europe, America, Central Africa, and Australia.6 Planchon concluded that since the 16th century (a) no more than five species had disappeared from Montpellier; (b) no single species had been destroyed by plant collectors and gardeners; (c) physical factors such as winds and water streams had dispersed certain plants over the region but had not resulted in the introduction of new species; (d) naturalization carried on by botanists had generally failed; (e) human effort had succeeded in introducing only three species, all of them aquatic; (f) the Port Juvenal wool washing factories had given the area an adventitious vegetation, of which only one species had become established; and (g) American species predominated among the naturalized plants.6

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Quinquinas As mentioned above, Planchon won the aggregation exam of the Faculté de Médicine de Montpellier, with a long composition (150 pages) about the quinquinas.4 In the introduction to the subject he remarked that the purpose of this work was to describe and analyze in an orderly fashion all the published information and not to add new experimental data. Planchon was helped in this task by several naturalists who provided him with samples of their collection of barks and commercial quinquinas gathered from different parts of South America. The paper was divided in two parts; the first was a general description of the subject and the second, an exposition about all the known medicinal species. The first part began with an historical review. Planchon wrote that the first botanical information about quinquina was collected at the beginning of the 18th century, although its medical uses were known way before, first under the name of countess powder (poudre de la comtesse; after being used to cure the Countess of Chinchón, wife of the Viceroy of Peru) and then Jesuits powder (poudre des Jésuites). As told by Planchon, the true nature of this medicine remained unknown until 1679 when the king Louis XIV (1638-1715) bought the secret from an Englishman named Talbot and learned about the medical bark but nothing about the tree that produced it. Charles Marie de la Condamine (1701-1774) was the first to provide scientific information about the tree, which he had gathered during a mission to Peru to measure the degree of latitude.21 There he joined as a botanist, the expedition of Joseph de Jussieu (1704-1779). According to de la Condamine, there were different genera and species of bark, which had been confused under the name of Cinchona. The 46 species of trees or shrubs actually composed eight different genera: Cinchona, Buena, Remigia, Exostemma, Pinkneya, Hymenodyctron, Luculia, and Danaïs. These eight groups showed a clear connection between their external forms and medical properties and were related to the geographical distribution of these vegetables over the globe. Thus Luculia and Hymenodyctron were located in the East Indies, Danaïs in the southern islands of Africa (i.e. Bourbon and France), Pinkeneya in Carolina and Georgia, Remigia in Brazil, Buena and Cinchona in Peru and the Andes of Bogota. Exostemma was somewhat more widely distributed. According to de la Condamine, there were three species of quinquina, white, yellow and red, which differed by their medical virtues. The most important was the red, although it did not have any remarkable difference with the yellow variety; they grew together and had similar flowers, leaves, and fruit. The tree did not grow in the plains; it could be distinguished from far because of its height. De la Condamine gave a detailed description (accompanied by drawings) of the principal organs of the tree: the leaves, branches, flowers, fruits, and seeds. He mentioned that the bark was locally known as corteza or cascara de Loxa, cascarilla, or palo de calenturas and the name quinquina probably originated from the native word quina, meaning bark. Due to its excellent properties as a febrifuge it was named quina quina (the bark of the barks).21 Afterwards, Planchon described the findings of additional explorers and naturalists, among them Jussieu, Joseph Dombey (1742-1794), Hipólito Ruiz López (1752-1816), José Antonio Pavón (1754-1840), José Celestino Mutis (1732-1808), Francisco José de Caldas (1768-1816), Francisco Antonio Zea (1776-1822), Alexander von Humboldt (1769-1859), and Weddell, each increasing the number of discovered varieties of quinquina, as well as knowledge about their geographical distribution. For example, Weddell explored Peru and Bolivia, described eight new varieties of quinquina (cinchona) and reported a detailed microscopic description of their organs.22 Planchon wrote that all the explorers and naturalists who had witnessed the collection procedures of the bark used by the cascarilleros had warned against the devastating effects caused by their procedure and expressed their worry that it could lead to the end of this valuable medicine. As a result, most of the European governments had begun efforts to introduce the species in more secure places in Asia, such as Java, Ceylon (Sri Lanka), and India.4 The second section described the botanical history of the quinquinas. Carl Linnaeus (1707- 1778) established the genus Cinchona on the basis of the information reported by de la 276

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Condamine about the quinquina of Loxa. Afterward, the name was changed to Cinchona officinalis and other botanists extended it to include the plants located in several other geographical regions. Later on, Augustin Pyramus de Candolle (1778-1841) put order in the confusion and fixed the definite definition of the genus. In his paper about quinquinas he described the distinctive characteristics of the plants belonging to this genus: , with two multiple winged seed enclosures possessing stamen hidden in the tube of the corolla, carpels dehiscent from the bottom to the top by splitting of the partition, interlocked broken grain seeds, and a calix limb serrated up to half its length and persistent up to the top of the capsule. This definition covered shrubs as well as tall trees.23 Planchon added to these items a detailed description of the leaves, flowers, and reproductive organs.4 Planchon closed this section with a description of the geographical distribution of the quinquinas. The plant grew generally at altitudes between 1600 to 2400 meters and its aspect varied according to the pertinent height. At high altitudes it grew under the forests as a bush or shrubs, at medium heights it associated with the lush vegetation of the tropical forests and then it became one of the highest trees in the forest. It did not exist in the plain region.4 The third section discussed the barks in particular; the bitter properties of quinquinas were present in different amounts in the flowers, leaves, and bark but only the latter was readily available in Europe. According to Planchon, a satisfactory procedure for classifying the barks had yet to be developed: the barks had been classified according to their color, their country of origin, their anatomical structure, by means of microscopic examination, according to the structure of particular layers or tissues, etc. etc. For this reason he left the subject and went on to describe the properties of the components known so far to be present in the bark: quinine, cinchonine, quinidine, cinchonidine, quinic, cinchotannic, and quinovic acids, quinquina red, yellow coloring matter, green fatty matter, starch, gum, and cellulose. For example, quinine, isolated in 1820 by Pierre-Joseph Pelletier (1788-1842) and Joseph Bienaimé Caventou (1795-1877), had achieved a tremendous medical and economical importance.24 It was prepared by treating quinine sulfate with ammonia; the purified product was white, crystalline, soluble in 240 parts of boiling water, in 400 of cold water, in 2 of boiling alcohol, and in 60 of ether. Quinine combined with a large number of acids to generate salts easily crystallizable, very bitter, and more or less soluble in water, alcohol, and ethers. The most important salt was the sulfate, a white crystalline salt, efflorescent in air, losing 12 parts of its crystallization water. The bisulfate was more soluble in water and for this reason highly employed in medicine. Pelletier and Caventou also reported that gray quinquina contained a soluble red coloring matter and a slightly soluble red coloring matter. The former was a kind of tannic acid differing from the one obtained from nutgall in forming a green precipitate with the salts of iron sesquioxide; under the influence of alkalis this precipitate easily absorbed oxygen from the air.24 The slightly soluble matter was odorless, insipid, and soluble in alcohol and alkalis. The alkali solutions were colored intense red.4 In 1830 Étienne Ossian Henry (1798-1873) and Auguste Delondre reported the finding of quinidine in the mother liquor of quinine and claimed it was actually a modification of quinine and cinchonine, joined together and made non-crystallizable by a particular yellow substance.25 Later on, Louis Pasteur (1822-1895) showed that quinidine was a mixture of two different alkaloids possessing very different crystalline forms, solubility, and rotating power. One of this was quinidine, an isomer of quinine; the other was cinchonidine, an isomer of cinchonine.26 Planchon ended this section with a short description of the pharmaceutical preparations available based on quinine, cinchonine, and quinquina barks, and the commercial aspects of quinquina. He mentioned, for example, that Bolivia alone had exported about 1,400 tons of bark in the years 1850 -1851.4 The second part of Planchon’s publication presented a description of the external characteristics, main anatomical details and content of active principle, of over 250 varieties of commercial quinquinas, divided in 27 different groups of Cinchonas, for example, Calisaya, Condaminea, 277

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Lucumaefolia, Lancelolata, Pitayensis, Peruviana, Pubescens, Humboldtiana, Mutisti, and Suberosa.4 Planchon, in his modernized version of Guibourt’s treatise Histoire Naturelle des Drogues Simples (vol 3, pages 108-196),8 included a more detailed version of his book about quinquinas, including longitudinal and transverse cross section drawings of the many varieties of cinchona barks.

Elemi At the time of Planchon the name elemi was given to the concrete resinous exudation from one or more terebinthaceous trees defined as Amiris elemifera, Amyris Plumieri, etc., growing naturally in Colombia, Mexico, India, Madagascar, etc. The resin brought into Europe came usually in loaves weighing 1 to 1.5 kg; it was semi-transparent, yellowish white, soft and unctuous, becoming hard and brittle by cold and age, and having a strong agreeable odor analogous to that of fennel. In 1822 Jean-François Bonastre (1783-1856) analyzed a sample of elemi resin extracted from Amyris elemifera and found it contained 60% of a clear resin (separated from the raw resin by distillation), soluble in cold alcohol, 24% of an opaque white resin substance soluble in boiling alcohol (elemine), 12% of volatile oil, 2.5% of a bitter extract, and 1.5% of impurities.27 In 1841 Henry Sainte-Claire Deville (1818-1881) wrote that the resin elemi appeared in several varieties differing by their consistency and the amount of impurities of woody material they contained. The amount of essence obtained by distillation varied widely. After being purified by standard procedures, it was colorless, totally limpid and fluid, having an agreeable odor, density 0.849 at 11.50C, refraction index 1.4719 at 140C, boiling point 1740C, and rotatory power -90.30. According to Deville, the essence was able to absorb a very large amount of HCl (47.68% of its weight).28 While attending the 1867 International Exposition (Paris), Planchon had the opportunity of examining a resin marked caragne, belonging to a collection of products originating from Nueva Granada (Colombia and neighboring countries). He believed that the sample was actually the same elemi resin described by Guibourt8; a chemical and physical examination of a sample not only proved him to be right but also allowed to state that Guibourt was correct in affirming that the elemi loaves sold in France was produced by a tree belonging to a species of the same genre as the resin produced by the Brazilian tree Iciba Icicariba. Guibourt assumed that the elemi in loaves was obtained from the tree Icica Caraña growing in the Orinoco and sent to France via Cartagena. Not only that, the caragne exhibited at the Exposition was different from the caragne sold in the French market for medical purposes. The latter was a green black tenacious resin, arriving from Mexico wrapped in reeds. Planchon could not guess what had caused the medical literature to change the name of the resin.29

Striated ipecacuanhas In 1872 Planchon published the results of a detailed investigation about the roots of ipecacuanhas known as striated.30 These emetic roots differed from other varieties by the longitudinal striae that marked their surface. He remarked that August E. Vogl (1833-1909) and Guibourt had extensively described these roots, but the details given seemed to indicate that the same name had been attributed to different species. Planchon added that he had been led to investigate further the botanical characteristics of these plants by the fact that this same confusion was present in many other writings about ipecacuanhas. His first results indicated that there were two kinds of striated ipecacuanhas, differing mainly in their dimensions, and which he named mayor and minor. The major variety, originating from New Granada, appeared in moderately long tawny grey fragments, up to 9-10 cm long and diameter varying between 5 and 9 mm, and having a surface coarsely striated longitudinally. As in the other species of ipecacuanha, a section of this 278

Revista CENIC Ciencias Biológicas, Vol. 46, No. 3, pp. 285-284, septiembre-diciembre, 2015. root revealed a cortical portion and a ligneous white yellow meditullium. Planchon remarked that the outstanding characters of this variety was the total absence of starch, the very small diameter of the vessels of the meditullium, the presence of a principle capable of reducing the cupro- potassium reagent (Fehling’s solution), and a content of less than 2.5% of emetine. The minor variety was composed of relatively small gray brown pieces, 2 to 3 cm long, and 5 to 6 mm diameter; having a yellow meditullium containing a large number of pores, a relatively developed liber zone, and containing starch and about 6.5% of emetine. The second part of this memoir was devoted to a speculation about the origin of the synonymy of these two kinds of striated ipecacuanha.30

Jaborandi In 1873 the Brazilian physician Dr. Symphronio Cesar Coutinho (1832-1887) went to France to continue his medical education and took samples of the Brazilian plant jaborandi, which he regularly used employed in his practice for inducing sweating and salivation. In the same year the French botanist and physician Henri Ernest Baillon (1827-1895) described the available information about jaborandi and wrote that in America, particularly Brazil, the name jaborandi was a general one applied to a series of very different plants presenting a group of common properties, such as being aromatic, stimulant, diuretic or sudorific, sialagogue, alexipharmic, etc.31 Baillon examined a small amount of stems and leaves of jaborandi and concluded they belonged to a plant of the same natural group as the Monniera trifoliata, which had been cultivated at the Jardin de Plantes (the main French botanical garden) under the name Pilocarpus simplex. He believed that the sample he had received corresponded to Pilocarpus pinnatifolius Lem. Baillon.31 The properties of jaborandi of inducing copious sweating and salivation attracted the attention of the medical profession and led to a series of publications on its potential therapeutic uses. In 1875 Dr. Adolph Gubler (1827-1879) published a comprehensive report of the clinical tests he had conducted at the Beaujon Hospital (Clichy, Paris).32 According to Gubler, an infusion prepared by adding 4 to 5 grams of powdered leaves to 150 or 200 g of boiling water, was slightly disagreeable to the taste and induced in a few minutes in most patients a series of extraordinarily intense physiological phenomena: prickling followed by intense facial coloring, coloring of the whole body, intense body sweating, and saliva release. The latter was so abundant that Gubler was able to collect more than a liter of the fluid within two hours. These symptoms were accompanied by a sensible increase of the body temperature and a notable decrease of intravascular pressure. In many situations these phenomena were attended by bronchial secretion and diarrhea. Interestingly enough, the cold infusion was able to produce an abundant sweating without increasing the body temperature.32 Gubler believed that although the active principle of Pilocarpus pinnatus was rapidly absorbed by the body and transported everywhere by the blood, its elimination was selectively carried out by the salivary and sudorific glands, which were intensively irritated by the active principle. Jaborandi should be considered a stimulant of the glandular activity the same as belladonna was a stupefacient or paralyzer. The salivation effects of jaborandi suggested its use in the treatment of mouth drying caused by atropism, different intoxicants, stomach upset, diabetes, etc.; the sudorific effects suggested its use in the treating of non-localized fever, bronchitis, influenza, rheumatism, typhus; and the combination of both effects, its use in the treatment of syphilis, insect and viper bites, rabies, poisoning by vegetables principles, etc. 32 In 1875 Planchon published a paper describing the characteristics and botanical origins of jaborandi. He mentioned that the unusual medical properties of this plant had generated a substantial interest and that except for Baillon’s work, little more was known about the structure of the plant itself. He had taken advantage of the fact that the Central Pharmacy of Paris had received a large shipment of the plant, containing roots, leaves of different ages, branches, stems, flowers, and fruits, to acquire a sample and carry on a detailed study of the structure of these 279

Revista CENIC Ciencias Biológicas, Vol. 46, No. 3, pp. 285-284, septiembre-diciembre, 2015. organs. Planchon’s examination of the different parts of the plant indicated that the roots contained coarse resiniferous cells in most of their layers; the peel under the outer bark contained a circle of clearly defined glands, similar to the oil producing glands of the citrus; the leaves contained numerous glands producing an essential oil and structured as the similar glands located in the back of the stem; and the flowers had a large number of well-developed glands producing an essential oil. All these findings led Planchon to conclude that jaborandi belonged to the genus Pilocarpus, of which it had all the characters; the disposition of its flowers and their structure was exactly that of plants belonging to this genus. He remarked that the fruit agreed completely with the one in the herbarium of the Museum marked as belonging to the Pilocarpus, and particularly to the Pilocarpus heterophyllus of Asa Gray.33

Strychnos According to Planchon, the bark of Hoang-Nan was a medicine promoted by the missionaries of Tong-King (Vietnam) as a highly efficient remedy for leprosy and hydrophobia. The bark originated from a shrub very similar to ivy, belonging to the Strychnos species growing in the mountainous area of the country. Eventually Planchon was able to obtain a sample on the bark and examine it.34 The bark was almost odorless and had a strong bitter taste. Its external face was verrucous, colored gray and black, and followed by an ochre red tissue. The internal tissue was red brown with longitudinal striae. In contact with nitric acid, all the layers showed clear-cut colored sections, an internal blood red section and a green black one on the ochre section. An anatomic inspection indicated the presence of four different layers: (a) a corky layer formed by cubic or rectangular cells, with thin walls; (b) a following parenchyma layer of similar thickness, formed by cells extended in the longitudinal sense; some which contained a yellow brown substance and a large number of calcium oxalate crystals; (c) a third layer built of yellow green stony cells; and (d) the following liber layer, the thicker of the four ones, formed by round polyhedral cells containing calcium oxalate crystals. For Planchon, these characteristics showed clearly that the Hoang-Nan bush was strongly related to false angostura (Strychnos Nux Vomica) and suggested the possibility its bark was a simple form of the bark of the latter. Although this opinion was supported by the fact that Frédéric Würtz had found that Hoang- Nan contained strychnine and brucine (the same alkaloids present in false angostura), 35 nevertheless, there were some important difference between the two barks: the missionary had reported that the brownish dust, which covered the bark, was the part employed by the natives who regarded the woody part of the bark as inert but believed that the external dust contained a strong poison. In addition, Pierre-Joseph Pelletier (1788-1842 and Joseph Bienaimé Caventou (1795-1877) had reported that the poisonous constituents of false angostura (strychnine and brucine) were located not in the outside corky layer but in the woody tissue below.34,36 Paul Cazeneuve (1852-1834) confirmed Planchon results and described a procedure for extracting strychnine and brucine from the bark.37 The correspondence between the barks of Hoang- Nan and false angostura led Planchon to study the similarity existing between the barks of different plants of the genus Strychnos having important medical interest, particularly those providing the different types of curare.38-45 The strychnos is a large genus of tropical trees and woody flowering vines belonging to family Loganiaceae (order ) and producing a berry that sometimes hold seeds extremely poisoning because of the alkaloids they contain. In his first publication on the subject, Planchon wrote that the diverse species of Strychnos studied (e.g. Strychnos nux vomica, Strychnos culebrina, Strychnos Castelnœa Wedd., Ourari, Guagney-Emeu, etc.) collected by the explorers and naturalists Hugh Algernon Weddell (1819- 1877), Francis de Castelnau (1810-1880), and Jules Nicolas Crévaux (1847-1882), presented the following common characteristics in their barks and woods: (a) the top layer of the bark was composed of suberic tissue, followed by a parenchymal layer having cells filled numerous crystals 280

Revista CENIC Ciencias Biológicas, Vol. 46, No. 3, pp. 285-284, septiembre-diciembre, 2015. and a reddish substance, a third layer of stony cells, and finally, another layer composed of many cellules, full of crystals; (b) the wood was composed of layers of ligneous tissue full of empty gaps, extending longitudinally and originating from the destruction of all the tissues.38-40 In several following papers, Planchon showed that all the plants used for the manufacture of curare belonged to the genus Strychnos and that the species of other families that entered into the composition of the poison played only a secondary part.41-45 The manufacture of the poison was concentrated in four distinct regions of South America: (1) Upper Orinoco-Rio Negro, (2) Upper Amazon, (3) French Guiana, and (4) British Guiana. Planchon provided botanical details of the Strychnos found in these regions, as well as the names of the local Indian tribes that used curare: (1) the region of the Rio Negro (the largest tributary of the Amazon river). Planchon obtained samples of the roots, stems, and leaves of the important species of this region during the 1878 Paris International Exposition. The venation of the leaves and the structure of the stem and roots proved this plant to be a Strychnos, which did not answer to any known species. Planchon suggested that that it be named Strychnos Gubleri and provided detailed diagrams of the structure of a section of a branch, the ligneous layers, and a transversal cut of the bark;41 (2) the very extensive region of the Upper Amazon, providing the curare of the Pebas, Ticunas, Orejones, and Yaguas Indians. The plant forming the basis of the curare was found during the expedition of de Castelnau and described by Weddell under the name Strychnos Castelaœna; Planchon remarked that it was usually associated with a menispermaceous plant, probably the Abata; he believed it was the Cocelus toxiderus Wedd. Jobert and Crévaux had recently brought these species to France and confirmed the statements of Weddell;42 (3) Upper French Guiana, furnishing the curare of the Roucouyenne and Trios Indians. According to Planchon, the important species of this region was Strychnos Crévauxii, a plant he had described in a previous publication.38 On the banks of the river Parou, an affluent of the Lower Amazon, it bore the name of Ourari or Urari, but it was perfectly distinct from the plants so designated in other regions. The curare extracted from the roots of Ourari was diluted with the juice of other plants not possessing toxic properties;43 and finally (4) British Guiana, furnishing the curare of the Macusis Indians prepared from Strychnos toxifera, Strychnos Schomburgkii Klotsch, and Strychnos cogens Benth.44

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