2,112 articles
Borage
Borage (Borago officinalis, starflower) is a Mediterranean annual herb with edible blue star flowers and cucumber-flavored leaves; its seed oil is the richest plant source of GLA, though oral borage oil shows no benefit for eczema.
Boraginaceae
Boraginaceae, the borage or forget-me-not family (Boraginales), comprises roughly 90 genera and 1,600–1,700 species sensu stricto, with rough-haired alternate leaves, scorpioid cymes, gynobasic styles, and four-nutlet fruits; APG IV treats it as the sole family of its order.
Boraginales
Boraginales, the borage order, is an order of lamiid flowering plants with ~2,700 species; APG IV treats it as one family Boraginaceae, while recent phylogenomics proposes nine families.
Boscia
Boscia Lam. (Capparaceae), a genus of about 30 unarmed shrubs and small trees of dry tropical Africa, Madagascar, and Arabia; petal-less flowers, indehiscent fruit, deep-rooted desert species, and African medicinal and fodder uses.
Boswellia
Boswellia (frankincense genus), Burseraceae trees of Africa, Arabia, and India; 25 species; resin contains boswellic acids (AKBA, KBA) inhibiting 5-LOX; studied for osteoarthritis; many species endangered.
Boswellia sacra
Boswellia sacra (Arabian frankincense tree, olibanum) is a 1.5–8 m Burseraceae tree of Somalia, Yemen, and Oman's Dhofar, source of frankincense resin traded since at least 2000 BC; Near Threatened on the IUCN Red List.
Boswellia serrata
Boswellia serrata (Indian frankincense, Shallaki) is an Indian resin-yielding tree whose boswellic acids, especially AKBA, underpin supplements studied mainly for knee osteoarthritis; evidence is modest and industry-funded.
Bougainvillea
Bougainvillea, a South American genus of Nyctaginaceae woody climbers grown for colorful bracts around small true flowers; discovered in Rio de Janeiro on the 1766-1769 La Boudeuse voyage and named after Louis Antoine de Bougainville.
Brachystegia
Brachystegia (msasa, miombo) is a genus of about 29 African legume trees dominating miombo woodlands of central and southern Africa, valued for timber, bark fibre, and food, with Pliocene diversification and hybridization complicating its taxonomy.
Brasenia schreberi
Brasenia schreberi (watershield, water shield, chun cai 莼菜, junsai) is the sole species of Cabombaceae genus Brasenia, a mucilage-coated floating-leaved aquatic plant of lakes and ponds across Africa, Asia, Australia, and the Americas, eaten in East Asia and globally rated Least Concern.
Brassica carinata
Brassica carinata, Ethiopian mustard or Abyssinian mustard, is an allotetraploid (BBCC, 2n=34) oilseed crop from the Ethiopian highlands, derived from B. nigra × B. oleracea, developed for jet fuel and industrial erucic oil.
Brassica nigra
Brassica nigra, black mustard (Sinapis nigra), an erect annual Brassicaceae herb with BB genome 2n=16, grown since antiquity for pungent sinigrin-rich seeds used as condiment mustard and oil; parent of B. juncea and B. carinata.
Brassicaceae
Brassicaceae (Cruciferae), the mustard or cabbage family of order Brassicales: ~4,000 species with cruciform flowers, tetradynamous stamens, siliques, glucosinolate defense, and crops like Brassica, plus Arabidopsis thaliana.
Brazil nut
Brazil nut (Amazon nut), seed of Bertholletia excelsa, the only globally traded wild-collected seed crop; Bolivia leads production and exports; very high selenium, 68-91 mcg per nut.
Brazilian rosewood
Brazilian rosewood names two trees: Aniba rosodora (pau-rosa), an endangered Amazonian laurel distilled for linalool-rich essential oil, and Dalbergia nigra, a Vulnerable Atlantic Forest timber tree on CITES Appendix I.
Breadfruit
Breadfruit (Artocarpus altilis) is a tropical tree in the mulberry family, cultivated for starchy fruits that taste like bread when roasted and grown in 90 countries.
Brosimum
Brosimum is a genus of 19 accepted Neotropical tree species in Moraceae, tribe Dorstenieae, described by Swartz in 1788; type species B. alicastrum (breadnut, ramón), with timber species B. guianense and B. rubescens.
Broussonetia
Broussonetia (paper mulberry genus), Moraceae trees native from India to Japan and Indo-China; B. papyrifera bark fiber made ancient Chinese paper and Polynesian tapa cloth, and the species is now invasive in Ghana, India, and elsewhere.
Broussonetia papyrifera
Broussonetia papyrifera, paper mulberry (tapa cloth tree), a Moraceae tree native from India to Korea and Indo-China; inner bark used for washi paper and Pacific tapa; carried by Austronesians to Remote Oceania, now invasive in parts of the USA, Ghana, and India.
Brucea
Brucea J.F.Mill. is a Paleotropical genus of bitter-barked shrubs in Simaroubaceae, about five to nine species, whose Brucea javanica (Ya-dan-zi) yields quassinoids such as bruceines used against dysentery, malaria, and cancer.
Brugmansia
Brugmansia (angel's trumpets, floripondios, tree daturas) is a Solanaceae genus of six to eight woody Andean South American species with pendulous fragrant trumpet flowers, tropane alkaloid toxicity, and close relation to Datura.
Bruguiera
Bruguiera (Lam. ex Savigny, 1798) is a genus of five accepted true mangrove tree species in Rhizophoraceae, native from East Africa to the West Pacific, with buttressed stems, knee pneumatophores, and explosive bird- or insect-triggered pollen release.
Bryonia
Bryonia (bryony) is a genus of ten climbing Cucurbitaceae herbs native from Macaronesia and Europe to Central Asia, sister to Ecballium, with dioecious and monoecious species and a two-millennium medicinal history.
Buckwheat
Buckwheat (Fagopyrum esculentum), a gluten-free Polygonaceae pseudocereal from China; seeds used for soba and kasha, plant used as cover crop; ~2 million tons produced 2024, led by China, Russia, Ukraine.
Buddleja
Buddleja (buddleia, butterfly bush) is a genus of about 114 accepted species of shrubs in Scrophulariaceae, native to tropical and subtropical America, Africa, Madagascar, and Asia; Buddleja davidii is a popular but invasive garden plant.
Bulgur
Bulgur (bulgar, bulghur, burgul) is parboiled, dried, partially debranned wheat, usually durum, sold cracked or whole; a Middle Eastern staple, tabbouleh base, and Turkey-dominated trade (HS 190430) with GI about 55-65.
Bulnesia
Bulnesia (lignumvitae, guayacán, palo santo) is a South American Zygophyllaceae genus described by Gay in 1846, native Peru to southern South America, with hard aromatic wood; B. sarmientoi is CITES Appendix II listed.
Burl
Burl: a large woody, rounded swelling on a tree trunk or branch with contorted, swirling grain, caused by stress such as insects, bacteria, fungi, or injury; benign, prized as burl wood, and distinct from galls and lignotubers.
Bursera
Bursera is an American genus of resinous, deciduous trees and shrubs in Burseraceae, centered in Mexico, with about 80-120 species yielding copal incense resin; B. simaruba is widespread, B. hollickii critically endangered.
Bursera graveolens
Bursera graveolens, palo santo or incense tree, is a dry-forest tree from Mexico to Peru, burned as incense and distilled for limonene-rich essential oil; IUCN Least Concern but Critically Endangered under Peruvian law.