Dorstenia

Dorstenia is a predominately Old and New World plant genus within the family Moraceae, but there is one Dorstenia species that is located in Indonesia and South Asia. There are 105 species within this genus that are fairly equally distributed between the Afrotropics and Neotropics, second only in number to the Ficus genera in Moraceae, but Dorstenia is unique when compared to other members of the Moraceae because of their extremely diverse growth habits and life forms. The majority of the Moraceae is woody perennials, while Dorstenia is dominated by herbaceous, succulent, or suffrutescent perennials, and only 10% exhibit the typical woody habit of the Moraceae. Dorstenia also have a striking reproductive structure composed of clusters of bisexual flowers on disc-shaped receptacles that are often adorned with variable size and shape bracts. Like most members of the Moraceae, Dorstenia have drupe fruits like peaches (peaches are not a member of the Moraceae), but another special feature of Dorstenia drupes is that they explode to release the seed. The seeds are usually small with a minuscule endosperm. The Dorstenia genus is also well known by indigenous people in the tropics as a medicinal plant with numerous flavonoid compounds that have anti-microbial, anti-reverse transcriptase, and anti-inflammatory effects.