''Ferula aucheri'',

synonym A synonym is a word, morpheme, or phrase that means exactly or nearly the same as another word, morpheme, or phrase in a given language. For example, in the English language, the words ''begin'', ''start'', ''commence'', and ''initiate'' are all ...

''Dorema aucheri'', is a plant that grows in

Iran Iran, officially the Islamic Republic of Iran, and also called Persia, is a country located in Western Asia. It is bordered by Iraq and Turkey to the west, by Azerbaijan and Armenia to the northwest, by the Caspian Sea and Turkmeni ...

. In

Persian Persian may refer to: * People and things from Iran, historically called ''Persia'' in the English language ** Persians, the majority ethnic group in Iran, not to be conflated with the Iranic peoples ** Persian language, an Iranian language of the ...

it is called بیلهر (Bilhar). It is the first

umbelliferous Apiaceae or Umbelliferae is a family of mostly aromatic flowering plants named after the type genus ''Apium'' and commonly known as the celery, carrot or parsley family, or simply as umbellifers. It is the 16th-largest family of flowering plants ...

plant found to produce exudate

flavonoids Flavonoids (or bioflavonoids; from the Latin word ''flavus'', meaning yellow, their color in nature) are a class of polyphenolic secondary metabolites found in plants, and thus commonly consumed in the diets of humans. Chemically, flavonoids ...

. It grows in the mountains of western of Iran (

Sedeh Sedeh ( fa, سده, also known as Sehdeh) is a city and capital of Sedeh District, in Eqlid County, Fars Province, Iran. Sedeh is located some north-to-northwest of Shiraz. At the 2006 census, its population was 5,572, in 1,497 families. It i ...

and Kermanshah). In Persian it is called كندل كوهي (kandale kohi) and in Kermanshah it is known as زو (zo). Harvested traditionally for cooking, the young leaves and branches of ''Ferula aucheri'' are typically used to make a famous pickle known as "Bilhar pickle" or used as vegetables in soup. It can also be cooked by steaming and served with butter as a meal. ''Ferula aucheri'' is used in parts of Iran as traditional medicine, believed to have uses as a stimulant, nervonic, antispasmodic, bronchodilator, expectorant, kidney stone repellent, emmenagogue and analgesic for visceral pain. Excessive harvesting of these plants for both cooking and traditional medicine has led it to become endangered in local provinces. Despite being used in both cooking and traditional Iranian medicine, ''Ferula aucheri'' has been shown to have hepatotoxic effects when extract of the plant has been injected into albino mice, causing necrosis, inflammation of the liver tissue, cell proliferation, cholestasis, and increases in release of the liver enzymes ALP, ALT (SGPT) and AST (SGOT).

Sources

Apioideae Flora of Iran {{Apiaceae-stub