Areca

Nuts have many uses, both industrial and domestic. For instance, the ivory nut, or tagua, is a source material for the manufacture of buttons and turnery articles. The kola nut supplies ingredients for popular cola beverages in the United States (see Carbonated beverages). StTychnos nux-vomica provides the important medicine and poison, strychnine. The areca or betel nut is chewed by the Indian and Malayan people as a narcotic a slice of the nut is placed in a leaf of the pepper plant Piper betle) together with a pinch of lime the mixture is an acrid, astringent narcotic that dyes the mouth red, blackens and destroys the teeth. The areca nut contains, among other alkaloids, arecoline, an active anthelminthic widely used in veterinary practice for the treatment of tapeworm infections. 

The areca or betel nut palm (Areca catechu) is indigenous to the Sunda Islands, but is widely cultivated in Far Eastern tropical countries, where... 

Arecoline is usually stated to be present to the extent of 0-1 per cent., but Chemnitius gives the yield of hydrobromide as 0-35 to 0-4 per cent. Arecaidine and guvacine occur in smaller quantities, whilst guvacoline and arecolidine are found only in minute amounts. Alkaloidal assay processes for areca nuts have been published by Bourcet, and the National Formulary Committee, and Bond has described a method of estimation for arecoline hydrobromide. A microchemical test for the identification of arecoline has been devised by Gornyi. ... 

Guvacoline, CjHjjOjN. K. Hess assigned this name to an alkaloid, obtained by E. Merck from areca nut, which yields a hydrobromide, short prisms, m.p. 144-5°, that he identified with guvacine methyl ester hydrobromide see above). The base is a colourless oil, b.p. 114°/13 mm., which yields a hydrochloride, m.p. 121-2°, a platinichloride, m.p. 211°, and on methylation furnishes a mixture of arecoline methiodide and hydriodide (p. 12). 

Arecoline, CgHj 302N. This, the most important alkaloid of areca nut, is an odourless, alkaline oil, b.p. 209°, volatile in steam, miseible with most organic solvents and water, but extractable from the latter by ether in presence of dissolved salts. The salts are crystalline, but usually deliquescent the hydrobromide, B. HBr, forms slender prisms, m.p. 177-9°, from hot alcohol the aurichloride, B. HAUCI4, is an oil, but the platinichloride, B2. H2PtClg, m.p. 176°, crystallises from water in orange-red rhombs. The methiodide forms glancing prisms, m.p. 173-4°. 

The cultivation and marketing of areca nuts has been described by Kannangara and its use as a masticatory in the Far East is discussed by Mercier.2 ... 

PARK Y B, JEON s M, BYUN s J, KIM H s, CHOI M s (2002) Absorption of intestinal free cholesterol is lowered by snpplementation of Areca catechu L. extract in rats. Life Sci. 70 1849-59. 

Betel-Quid and Areca Nut Chewing (IARC Monograph) International Agency for Research on Cancer Lyon, France, 1985 Vol. 37, pp 141-291. 

Areca tobacum Areca Arecoline, areca id ine, Muscarinic ACh agonist... 

Areca (Areca catechu). Reprinted from Culbreth DMR. (1927). Materia Medica and Pharmacognosy, 7th ed. Philadelphia Lea Febiger. 

Areca (Areca catechu) is a palm tree that grows up to 30 meters in height (Gruenwald et al. 1998 Robbers et al. 1996). It is cultivated in India, southeast Asia, the East Indies, and East Africa. It grows green leaflets and numerous flowers. The fruit of the areca palm is a nut that contains a single seed and a thin seed coat (figure 4.10). Areca is chewed alone or... 

The areca nut is sometimes erroneously referred to as the betel nut (Trivedy et al. 1999). Betel refers to a combined preparation of the areca nut (Areca catechu) and lime (calcium hydroxide), rolled into the leaf of the betel pepper (Piper betle) (Morton 1998). 

Acetylcholine All four alkaloids derived from areca (arecoline, arecaidine, guvacoline, and guvacine) act as full agonists at muscarinic acetylcholine receptors (Wolf-Pflugmann et al. 1989). Peripherally administered arecoline (10 mg/kg) subtly reduces cortical and subcortical acetylcholine levels (Molinengo et al. 1986). 

A dependency syndrome occurs in many who chew areca (Trivedy et al. 1999). This is not entirely suprising because other cholinergic stimulants (e.g., tobacco) also have addictive properties, and arecoline causes a release of dopamine like many other abused drugs. Use of areca persists despite adverse health effects—one of the criteria for addiction. 

Associations have also been made between areca and cardiovascular disease, diabetes, and asthma (Winstock et al. in press). Areca may affect cardiovascular disease by increasing homocysteine concentrations and/or through areca copper concentrations and interaction with the lysyl oxidase enzyme (Trivedy et al. 1999). Areca chewing has been associated with cardiac dysrhythmias in a few cases and a case of myocardial infarction was temporally associated with areca use (Hung and Deng 1998 Chiang etal. 1998). 

Approximately 61% of people with asthma report that areca aggravates the condition. Clinical studies show that areca causes broncho-... 

Areca may interact adversely with antipsychotic medications (Deahl 1989). Two cases have been reported of schizophrenic patients who were taking neuroleptics and developed severe extrapyramidal symptoms after areca chewing. Given the functional antagonism between dopamine and acetylcholine in the striatum, it is likely that arecoline amplified the dyskinetic effect of neuroleptic medications. 

Areca (Areca catechu) is a tall palm tree that yields a nut, commonly chewed in Asia for its stimulant effects. It is discussed at greater length in chapter 4, but is mentioned here briefly for its cognitive effects. Areca s psychoactive constituents (arecoline, arecaidine, guvacoline, and guvacine) are agonists at muscarinic acetylcholine receptors. They also directly inhibit reuptake of GABA. 

In addition to autonomic effects, areca produces mental stimulation, increases cerebral blood flow and glucose metabolism, and creates electrophysiological activation as seen on the EEG. 

Studies on the cognitive effects of areca are scarce, but its known cholinergic mechansims have led some researchers to formally investigate the effects. Arecoline improves memory on a staircase test in rats, but effects were dose dependent (Molinengo et al. 1995). A low dose (0.5 mg/kg) improves performance, but a large dose (3.5-8 mg/kg) causes impair-... 

Hoffmann D, Brunnemann KD, Prokopczyk B, Djordjevic MV. (1994). Tobacco-specific N-nitrosamines and Areca-derived N-nitrosamines chemistry, biochemistry, carcinogenicity, and relevance to humans. J Toxicol Environ Healdi. 41(1) 1-52. 

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