Morphology

It is a perrenial creeping weed, prostrate or ascending herb up to 1 m long or more, having spreading branches, The roots are stout and fusiform with a woody root stock. The stem is prostrate, woody or succulent, cylindrical, often purplish, hairy and thickened at the nodes. Leaves are simple, thick, fleshy and hairy, arranged in unequal pairs, green and glabrous above and usally white underneath; ovate-oblong, round or subcordate at the base with smooth, wavy, or undulate margins; up to 5.5 x 3.3 cm2 in area. Flowers are minute, subcapitate, present 4-10 together in small bracteolate umbels, forming axillary and terminal panicles; hermaphrodite, pedicellate, and pink, or pinkish-red in color; Bracts are deciduous and involucrate; Calyx and corolla replaced by perianth which is tubular in shape, the tube being short and narrow at the base and funnel-shaped at the top and constricted above the ovary. There are five lobes, which are small and acute. Two or three stamens are present and are slightly exserted. The stigma is peltate. The fruit is an achene and is detachable, ovate, oblong, pubescent, fiveribbed and glandular, anthocarpous, and viscid on the ribs.

It is found in India, Brazil, Africa, Australia, China, Egypt, Pakistan, Sudan, Sri Lanka, USA, Iran and Middle East countries

Anemia, Inflammation