tuvaraka :

Morphology:

Tuvaraka is an evergreen deciduos tree with can grow upto 16m or more in height.

Bark is rough, brown and wood whitish but generally becomes brownish-grey due to fungal sapstain and turns streaked.

Leaves are oblong, ovate or elliptic, somewhat serrate and 10-16 cm long.

Flowers of this herb are small, solitary fascicles and greenish white.

Fruits are globose, mammilate, tomentose and 5.1-10.2 cm diameter.

It bears the fruits between the months of august and September

seeds are striate, sub avoid, obtusely angular and 2.0-2.5 cm long.

Flowering occurs from january to April.

Seeds obtusely angular, elongate - obovate, dark brown, 8 to15 mm in width and 12 to 28 mm in length; testa longitudinally ridged and stony; cotyledons two, thin, papery; endosperm, abundant and oily; odour, indistinct; taste, acidic

Histology:

TS through micropylar region of the seed shows seed coat, endosperm and embryo; the seed coat has outer

testa made up of three types of cells: (i) an outer parenchymatous epidermis with vascular supply, with a few

sclereids present around xylem; ii) a middle sclerotic tissue of cells with four distinct zones , a few outer layers

of isodiametric sclerotic cells upto 30 µ diameter, with thick walls and simple pits, followed by radially elongated

thick walled cell; a middle uniseriate, ribbon shaped thick walled sclereids elongated up to 900 µ; a few layers of

tangentially elongated sclereids; (iii) an inner multiseriate epidermal layer with thin walled isodiametric,compactly

arranged cells; tegmen is undifferentiated and is almost crushed by the endosperm; endosperm consists of

compactly arranged isodiametric thinwalled parenchymatous cells, filled with oil globules and abundant rosettes

of calcium oxalate prisms of 15 to 20 µ; cotyledons two, possess single layer of epidermal cells with brick shaped

cells; mesophyll undifferentiated.

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