starwort root - inartio

\[ **BT: [[plants]] | [[Chinese medicine]]** ] --- # *Radix stellariae* (starwort root) **Binominal:** *Radix stellariae* **Chinese:** 银柴胡 (yín chái hú) Perennial herb belonging to the family Caryophyllaceae.[^1] ![[from tcmly dot com dot yin chai hu -- stellaria-dichotoma 1.jpg|400]] - On Baidu Baike, Starwort is called *silver bupleurum* or *yin bupleurum*.[^2] - It is called *white root* and *yinhu* (银胡) in *[[Materia Medica Seeking Truth]]*.[^3] - Further folk names include: **silver beetle**, **mountain cabbage root**, and **mountain grasshopper**.[^4] --- ## starwort root in Chinese medicine Starwort Root was first mentioned in *Ben Cao Gang Mu Shi Yi* (a supplement to the compendium of materia medica) in the thirtieth year of Qianlong in the [[history--China#Qing dynasty (1644–1912)|Qing dynasty (1644–1912)]].[^3] ### properties and uses > - Anti-oxidation, anti-allergy, and anti-cancer. > - Inhibiting sperm viability and reducing sperm survival rate. > - Reducing the lipid content of the aorta and preventing atherosclerosis. > - Clearing heat and cooling blood, treating consumptive fever, hot flashes, night sweats, fever caused by yin deficiency. > - Clearing deficient heat, treating infantile malnutrition with fever, abdominal distension, thirst with emaciation, and dry hair caused by indigestion or parasitic malnutrition.[^4] | | | | ---------------------------------------------------------- | --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- | | **Part Used** | dried root | | **Harvest/Production** | Radix Stellariae is produced mainly in the provinces of Inner Mongolia, Ningxia, Gansu, and Shanxi.[^5] Dug up in spring and summer when the plant is sprouting.[^6] Also in late autumn, when the leaves are withered.[^7] excavated cultivating herbs in middle September in the third year or in the middle April of the fourth year[^8] | | **Harvest & Processing** | After collection it is washed, dried in sunlight and sliced.[^9] Remove withered stem, fibrous root and soil, and sun-dry.[^10] | | **Flavour, Property, & Channel Tropism** | Sweet in flavour, slightly cold in property, acting on the Liver and Stomach channels.[^11] | | **Functions** | Relieves fever in Deficiency conditions.[^12] | | **Chemistry** | Mainly contains spinasterol, 7-stigmasterol and stellaria cyclopetide I. | | **Pharmacology** | Serum-cholesterol-density-reducing, coefficient of cholesterol /cephalin and aorta-lipoid reducing. | | **Clinical Use & Major Combinations/Properties & Actions** | For fever due to [[Yin deficiency is due to the excess consumption of vital materials including Fluid, Essence and Blood or to fever impairing those materials. It may lead to a relative overabundance of Yang.]], consumptive fever, and fever with infantile malnutrition, it is used with [[Cortex Lycii Radicis]] (Di Gu Pi), [[Carapax Trionycis]] (Bie Jia), and [[Herba Artemisiae Annuae]] (Qing Hao).[^13] Also for osteopyrexia.[^14] | | **Dosage & Adminstration** | Oral administration: decocting, 5-10g; or made as pills or powders. 3–9 g, decocted in water for an oral dose.[^15] | | **Precautions** | Contraindicated for invasion of Wind Cold or for cases without fever due to Blood Deficiency.[^16] | | **Examples** | 1. Treat hectic fever and consumptive fever: lanceolate dichotomous star wort 1.5 qian, figwortflower picrorhiza, gentian, turtle shell (vinegar stir-fried), lycium bark, sweet wormwood herb, anemarrhena 1 qian each, ural licorice 5 fen. Put into two cups of water, decoct to 8 fen, and swallow. 2. Treat consumptive disease and pyrexia in males and females, with or without cough: lanceolate dichotomous star wort, ladybell of equal amount, take 2 qian each time, decoct in water and swallow. 3. Treat epidemic febrile disease, hectic fever, physical weakness, chapped skin, emaciated and not plump: lanceolate dichotomous star wort 2 qian, turtle shell 3 qian.[^17] | ## ↬ external resources - [Yin Chai Hu (Stellaria Roots)](https://www.meandqi.com/herb-database/stellaria-root) - [银柴胡](http://www.a-hospital.com/w/%E9%93%B6%E6%9F%B4%E8%83%A1) - [Starwort Root](https://tcmwiki.com/wiki/starwort-root) [^1]: ‘Yin Chai Hu (Starwort Root): Uses, Benefits, Side Effects, Warnings’, Herbs List, *TCMLY: Traditional Chinese Medicine*, 22 January 2022, [https://tcmly.com/yin-chai-hu/](https://tcmly.com/yin-chai-hu/) [^2]: ‘银柴胡 \[Silver Bupleurum]’, Baike Baidu, last edited 27 January 2024, https://baike.baidu.com/item/%E9%93%B6%E6%9F%B4%E8%83%A1/881296. [^3]: ‘Yin Chai Hu (Starwort Root): Uses, Benefits, Side Effects, Warnings’, Herbs List, *TCMLY: Traditional Chinese Medicine*, 22 January 2022, [https://tcmly.com/yin-chai-hu/](https://tcmly.com/yin-chai-hu/) [^4]: ‘Yin Chai Hu (Starwort Root): Uses, Benefits, Side Effects, Warnings’, Herbs List, *TCMLY: Traditional Chinese Medicine*, 22 January 2022, [https://tcmly.com/yin-chai-hu/](https://tcmly.com/yin-chai-hu/) [^5]: ‘Starwort’, *Chinese Medicinal Material Images Database*, 2024, accessed 15 April 2024, https://sys01.lib.hkbu.edu.hk/cmed/mpid/detail.php?sort=latin&lang=eng&qry=+%E9%93%B6%E6%9F%B4%E8%83%A1&herb_id=D00206. [^6]: ‘Starwort’, *Chinese Medicinal Material Images Database*, 2024, accessed 15 April 2024, https://sys01.lib.hkbu.edu.hk/cmed/mpid/detail.php?sort=latin&lang=eng&qry=+%E9%93%B6%E6%9F%B4%E8%83%A1&herb_id=D00206. [^7]: Jing-Nuan Wu, ‘Radix Stellariae’, *[[Wu, An Illustrated Chinese Materia Medica, 2005|An Illustrated Chinese Materia Medica]]* (Oxford University Press, 2005), p. 610. [^8]: ‘Starwort’, *Chinese Medicinal Material Images Database*, 2024, accessed 15 April 2024, https://sys01.lib.hkbu.edu.hk/cmed/mpid/detail.php?sort=latin&lang=eng&qry=+%E9%93%B6%E6%9F%B4%E8%83%A1&herb_id=D00206. [^9]: Jing-Nuan Wu, ‘Radix Stellariae’, *[[Wu, An Illustrated Chinese Materia Medica, 2005|An Illustrated Chinese Materia Medica]]* (Oxford University Press, 2005), p. 610. [^10]: ‘Starwort’, *Chinese Medicinal Material Images Database*, 2024, accessed 15 April 2024, https://sys01.lib.hkbu.edu.hk/cmed/mpid/detail.php?sort=latin&lang=eng&qry=+%E9%93%B6%E6%9F%B4%E8%83%A1&herb_id=D00206. [^11]: Jing-Nuan Wu, ‘Radix Stellariae’, *[[Wu, An Illustrated Chinese Materia Medica, 2005|An Illustrated Chinese Materia Medica]]* (Oxford University Press, 2005), p. 610. [^12]: Jing-Nuan Wu, ‘Radix Stellariae’, *[[Wu, An Illustrated Chinese Materia Medica, 2005|An Illustrated Chinese Materia Medica]]* (Oxford University Press, 2005), p. 610. [^13]: Jing-Nuan Wu, ‘Radix Stellariae’, *[[Wu, An Illustrated Chinese Materia Medica, 2005|An Illustrated Chinese Materia Medica]]* (Oxford University Press, 2005), p. 610. [^14]: ‘Starwort’, *Chinese Medicinal Material Images Database*, 2024, accessed 15 April 2024, https://sys01.lib.hkbu.edu.hk/cmed/mpid/detail.php?sort=latin&lang=eng&qry=+%E9%93%B6%E6%9F%B4%E8%83%A1&herb_id=D00206. [^15]: Jing-Nuan Wu, ‘Radix Stellariae’, *[[Wu, An Illustrated Chinese Materia Medica, 2005|An Illustrated Chinese Materia Medica]]* (Oxford University Press, 2005), p. 610. [^16]: Jing-Nuan Wu, ‘Radix Stellariae’, *[[Wu, An Illustrated Chinese Materia Medica, 2005|An Illustrated Chinese Materia Medica]]* (Oxford University Press, 2005), p. 610. [^17]: ‘Starwort’, *Chinese Medicinal Material Images Database*, 2024, accessed 15 April 2024, https://sys01.lib.hkbu.edu.hk/cmed/mpid/detail.php?sort=latin&lang=eng&qry=+%E9%93%B6%E6%9F%B4%E8%83%A1&herb_id=D00206.