Powdered Senna Leaf
Cassia leaf; Cassia angustifolia
Powdered Senna is Senna dried compound leaves of Cassia angustifolia or Cassia sennaVahal. (Fam.
Leguminosae)reduced to a fine or very fine powder.
Senna leaf contains not less than 1.0 per cent w/w of total sennosides calculated as sennoside B, on the dried basis.
Category. Purgative, anthelmintic, febrifuge, vibandha
Description.Alight brown to dark brown powder with faint and distinctive odour; taste, mucilaginous and
disagreeable but not distinctly bitter.
IDENTIFICATION
Microscopic examination
Powder study
Examine under a microscope( Appendix --) The powder shows the following diagnostic characters: Fragments of
upper and lowerepidermis, composed of cells with smooth and straight anticlinal walls, polygonal in outline,
embedded with numerous paracytic and few anomocytic stomata; numerous, thick walled, unicellular, warty,
straight or bent trichomes scattered and/or attached to the cells of epidermis, both epidermises have cicatrices where
the trichomes were attached; abundant calcium oxalate crystals, as prisms in cells of parenchymatous sheath
surrounding the group of fibres (crystal sheath), as cluster crystals in cells of spongy mesophyll,both crystals are
also found scattered; fibres in groups, thick-walled, lignified with few pits; few simple spherical starchgrains
scattered or in parenchymatous cells.
Quantitative microscopy(Appendix ---). Stomatal index (upper surface) for Cassia angustifoliais 17.1 to 19.o to
20.7, (lower surface) is 17.0 to 18.3 to 19.3; for Cassia senna (upper surface) 11.4 to 12.4 to 13.3, (lower Surface)is
10.8 to 11.8 to 12.6.
Vein-islet numbers for C.angustifoliais range19.5-22.5; average 21; C.senna is15-29.5; average 26
Vein termination numbers: C.angustifolia is 25.9-32.8; C.senna 32.7-40.2
Microchemistry (appendix--)Under Microsublimation-test for anthraquinones and under Histochemical
determination of cell wall and contents – test for lignified fibres and mucilage.
Adulteration with Cassia auriculata and Ailanthus glandulosa, describing their presence based on specific
features like stomata, trichomes and calcium oxalate crystals
