General characteristics and Qualitative phytochemical screening of Artocarpus lakoocha fruit.

Anita Tomar¹, Rashmi²* and Anubha Srivastava^1
1Centre for Social Forestry and Eco-rehabilitation, Allahabad, U.P
²Chemistry Division, Forest Research Institute, Dehradun, Uttarakhand, India

A B S T R A C T
Artocarpus lakoocha Roxb., belongs to family Moraceae, is a valuable tropical tree species native to India and used for fruit, fodder, furniture, timber, and feed. Farmers plant this species as a source of green fodder. It is considered one of the most important milk producing forages. In the present study, we analyzed the general characteristics of the fruits of A. lakoocha and its qualitative phytochemical screening. For the study, fruit collection was done from Allahabad district which lies between 24°47` and 25 °47`N latitude and 81°9` and 82°21`E longitude at an elevation of 98m amsl. After cleaning the fruits, observations on fruit morphological parameters were taken with respect to fruit length, width and weight. The fruits are irregularly rounded. The 100 Fruit weight mostly fall in the range of 15.9-17.6 kg. The number of seeds per fruit varies accordingly, but usually there are 22-73 seeds in one fruit. Fruit length varied from 6.8 to 14.4 mm and fruit thickness from 9.05 to 13.65 mm. Young fruits are green, turning yellow at the time of maturity and then later brown. Qualitative Phytochemical analysis of fruits extracts of A. lakoocha was carried out by standard methods. In brief, the phytochemicals such as tannins, alkaloids, saponins, flavanoids, terpenoids and phenols/polyphenols were qualitatively determined in its fruits.
Keywords: fruit, fodder, phytochemicals, threatened, conservation