Croton membranaceus seedlings

Roselle is an erect, mostly branched, annual to perennial plant growing up to 4.5 metres tall. The stems often become woody, at least at the base, and persist for more than a year. An important multipurpose plant supplying a range of foods, medicines and other products It has been grown as a food crop for around 6,000 years.

The fresh calyx (the outer whorl of the flower) is eate n raw or cooked. It is rich in pectin and citric acid. The ripe calyces are diuretic and antiscorbutic. The succulent calyx, boiled in water, is used as a drink in the treatment of bilious attacks. The flowers contain gossypetin, anthocyanin, and the glycoside hibiscin.

These may have diuretic and choleretic effects, decreasing the viscosity of the blood, reducing blood pressure and stimulating intestinal peristalsis. The plant is a tropical beverage
used commonly in folk medicines to treat hypertension, pyrexia, inflammation, liver disorders, kidney and urinary bladder stones, and obesity (Liu et al., 2006).

The dried flower extracts possessed antioxidant activity and protected rat hepatocytes from t-BHP-induced cytotoxicity and genotoxicity (Christian et al., 2006; Falade et al., 2005). The urine of 36 healthy subjects, after consumption of the flower juice, showed a decrease of creatinine, uric acid, citrate, tartrate, calcium, sodium, potassium and phosphate but not oxalate (Carvajal-Zarrabal et al., 2005).

This could help the treatment and prevention of renal stones.