''Sterculia foetida'' is a soft wooded tree that can grow up to tall.Sterculia Foetida"
- Meet the Plants - National Tropical Botanical Garden Plant Database. Web. 08 Dec. 2013. Common names for the plant are the bastard poon tree, java olive tree, hazel sterculia, wild almond tree, and skunk tree.

Description

The branches of ''Sterculia foetida'' are arranged in

whorl A whorl ( or ) is an individual circle, oval, volution or equivalent in a whorled pattern, which consists of a spiral or multiple concentric objects (including circles, ovals and arcs). Whorls in nature File:Photograph and axial plane floral ...

s; they spread horizontally. The tree's bark is smooth and gray. The

leaves A leaf (plural, : leaves) is any of the principal appendages of a vascular plant plant stem, stem, usually borne laterally aboveground and specialized for photosynthesis. Leaves are collectively called foliage, as in "autumn foliage", wh ...

are placed at the end of branchlets; they have petioles ranging from in length; the blades are palmately compound, containing 7–9 leaflets. The leaflets are elliptical, 100–170 mm long, and shortly petioluled The petioles are the source of the foul smell of the plant. The flowers are arranged in

panicles A panicle is a much-branched inflorescence. (softcover ). Some authors distinguish it from a compound spike inflorescence, by requiring that the flowers (and fruit) be pedicellate (having a single stem per flower). The branches of a panicle are o ...

, long. The green or purple flowers are large and unisexual as the tree is

dioecious Dioecy (; ; adj. dioecious , ) is a characteristic of a species, meaning that it has distinct individual organisms (unisexual) that produce male or female gametes, either directly (in animals) or indirectly (in seed plants). Dioecious reproductio ...

(male and female flowers are found on different trees). The pollens are oval in shape, approximately 40 microns in length. The calyx is dull orange and is divided into five

sepal A sepal () is a part of the flower of angiosperms (flowering plants). Usually green, sepals typically function as protection for the flower in bud, and often as support for the petals when in bloom., p. 106 The term ''sepalum'' was coined b ...

s, each one long. The fruit consists of four to five follicles, each follicle generally containing 10–15 seeds. The follicles are scarlet when ripe. In India, flowers appear in March, and the leaves appear between March and April. At

Hyderabad Hyderabad ( ; , ) is the capital and largest city of the Indian state of Telangana and the ''de jure'' capital of Andhra Pradesh. It occupies on the Deccan Plateau along the banks of the Musi River (India), Musi River, in the northern part ...

(India), flowering was observed in September–October (2015) with ripened fruits on the top part and young green fruits at the lower branches. The fruit is ripe in February (11 months after the flowers appeared).

Taxonomy

The species was described in 1753 by

Carl Linnaeus Carl Linnaeus (; 23 May 1707 – 10 January 1778), also known after his ennoblement in 1761 as Carl von Linné Blunt (2004), p. 171. (), was a Swedish botanist, zoologist, taxonomist, and physician who formalised binomial nomenclature, the ...

. It is the

type species In zoological nomenclature, a type species (''species typica'') is the species name with which the name of a genus or subgenus is considered to be permanently taxonomically associated, i.e., the species that contains the biological type specimen ...

of the genus ''

Sterculia ''Sterculia'' is a genus of flowering plants in the mallow family, Malvaceae: subfamily Sterculioideae (previously placed in the now obsolete Sterculiaceae). Members of the genus are colloquially known as tropical chestnuts. ''Sterculia'' ma ...

'' and both names mean bad-smelling: the name ''Sterculia'' comes from

Sterquilinus In Roman mythology, Sterquilinus — also called Stercutus and Sterculius — was a god of odor. He may have been equivalent to Picumnus. The ''Larousse Encyclopaedia of Mythology'' gives the name as Stercutius, a pseudonym of Saturn, under whi ...

, the Roman god of fertilizer or manure.

Distribution

''Sterculia foetida'' has been found in many areas, including

India India, officially the Republic of India (Hindi: ), is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by area, the second-most populous country, and the most populous democracy in the world. Bounded by the Indian Ocean on the so ...

Taiwan Taiwan, officially the Republic of China (ROC), is a country in East Asia, at the junction of the East and South China Seas in the northwestern Pacific Ocean, with the People's Republic of China (PRC) to the northwest, Japan to the nort ...

Indochina Mainland Southeast Asia, also known as the Indochinese Peninsula or Indochina, is the continental portion of Southeast Asia. It lies east of the Indian subcontinent and south of Mainland China and is bordered by the Indian Ocean to the west an ...

, the

Philippines The Philippines (; fil, Pilipinas, links=no), officially the Republic of the Philippines ( fil, Republika ng Pilipinas, links=no), * bik, Republika kan Filipinas * ceb, Republika sa Pilipinas * cbk, República de Filipinas * hil, Republ ...

(where it is known as ''kalumpang''),

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territorie ...

(

Hawaii Hawaii ( ; haw, Hawaii or ) is a state in the Western United States, located in the Pacific Ocean about from the U.S. mainland. It is the only U.S. state outside North America, the only state that is an archipelago, and the only stat ...

Indonesia Indonesia, officially the Republic of Indonesia, is a country in Southeast Asia and Oceania between the Indian and Pacific oceans. It consists of over 17,000 islands, including Sumatra, Java, Sulawesi, and parts of Borneo and New Guine ...

Ghana Ghana (; tw, Gaana, ee, Gana), officially the Republic of Ghana, is a country in West Africa. It abuts the Gulf of Guinea and the Atlantic Ocean to the south, sharing borders with Ivory Coast in the west, Burkina Faso in the north, and To ...

Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a Sovereign state, sovereign country comprising the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous List of islands of Australia, sma ...

Mozambique Mozambique (), officially the Republic of Mozambique ( pt, Moçambique or , ; ny, Mozambiki; sw, Msumbiji; ts, Muzambhiki), is a country located in southeastern Africa bordered by the Indian Ocean to the east, Tanzania to the north, Malawi ...

, and

Togo Togo (), officially the Togolese Republic (french: République togolaise), is a country in West Africa. It is bordered by Ghana to the west, Benin to the east and Burkina Faso to the north. It extends south to the Gulf of Guinea, where its c ...

Toxicity and uses

The oil of ''Sterculia foetida'' has been found to be comparable to

sunflower The common sunflower (''Helianthus annuus'') is a large annual forb of the genus ''Helianthus'' grown as a crop for its edible oily seeds. Apart from cooking oil production, it is also used as livestock forage (as a meal or a silage plant), as ...

soybean The soybean, soy bean, or soya bean (''Glycine max'') is a species of legume native to East Asia, widely grown for its edible bean, which has numerous uses. Traditional unfermented food uses of soybeans include soy milk, from which tofu an ...

, and grapeseed oils for the use of

biofuel Biofuel is a fuel that is produced over a short time span from biomass, rather than by the very slow natural processes involved in the formation of fossil fuels, such as oil. According to the United States Energy Information Administration (E ...

s. ''Sterculia foetida'' oil contains

cyclopropene Cyclopropene is an organic compound with the formula . It is the simplest cycloalkene. Because the ring is highly strained, cyclopropene is difficult to prepare and highly reactive. This colorless gas has been the subject for many fundamental st ...

fatty acid In chemistry, particularly in biochemistry, a fatty acid is a carboxylic acid with an aliphatic chain, which is either saturated or unsaturated. Most naturally occurring fatty acids have an unbranched chain of an even number of carbon atoms, fr ...

s (CPFA) such as 8,9 methylene-heptadec-8-enoic acid (

malvalic acid Malvalic acid is a cyclopropene fatty acid found in baobab seed oil and cottonseed oil. The cyclopropene ring is thought to be one of the causes of abnormalities that develop in animals that ingest cottonseed oil. Refining processes, such as hyd ...

) and 9,10-methylene-ocadec-9-enoic acid (

sterculic acid Sterculic acid is a cyclopropene fatty acid. It is found in various plants of the genus '' Sterculia'', including being the main component of ''Sterculia foetida'' seed oil. Biosynthesis The biosynthesis of sterculic acid begins with the cyclop ...

). The

flash point The flash point of a material is the "lowest liquid temperature at which, under certain standardized conditions, a liquid gives off vapours in a quantity such as to be capable of forming an ignitable vapour/air mixture". (EN 60079-10-1) The fl ...

iodine Iodine is a chemical element with the symbol I and atomic number 53. The heaviest of the stable halogens, it exists as a semi-lustrous, non-metallic solid at standard conditions that melts to form a deep violet liquid at , and boils to a vi ...

value, free fatty acid count,

phosphorus Phosphorus is a chemical element with the symbol P and atomic number 15. Elemental phosphorus exists in two major forms, white phosphorus and red phosphorus, but because it is highly reactive, phosphorus is never found as a free element on Ear ...

content,

cloud point In liquids, the cloud point is the temperature below which a transparent solution undergoes either a liquid-liquid phase separation to form an emulsion or a liquid-solid phase transition to form either a stable sol or a suspension that settles a p ...

pour point The pour point of a liquid is the temperature below which the liquid loses its flow characteristics. It is defined as the minimum temperature in which the oil has the ability to pour down from a beaker. In crude oil a high pour point is generally ...

viscosity The viscosity of a fluid is a measure of its resistance to deformation at a given rate. For liquids, it corresponds to the informal concept of "thickness": for example, syrup has a higher viscosity than water. Viscosity quantifies the inte ...

at 40 °C, oxidative stability at 110 °C,

density Density (volumetric mass density or specific mass) is the substance's mass per unit of volume. The symbol most often used for density is ''ρ'' (the lower case Greek letter rho), although the Latin letter ''D'' can also be used. Mathematical ...

, and trace metal count are all within

ASTM ASTM International, formerly known as American Society for Testing and Materials, is an international standards organization that develops and publishes voluntary consensus technical standards for a wide range of materials, products, systems, an ...

and EN specifications. Evidence suggests that the seeds are edible, but purgative, and should be roasted prior to eating. At least one review indicates that CPFA such as sterculic acid are

carcinogen A carcinogen is any substance, radionuclide, or radiation that promotes carcinogenesis (the formation of cancer). This may be due to the ability to damage the genome or to the disruption of cellular metabolic processes. Several radioactive substan ...

ic,

co-carcinogen A co-carcinogen is a chemical that promotes the effects of a carcinogen in the production of cancer. Usually, the term is used to refer to chemicals that are not carcinogenic on their own, such that an equivalent amount of the chemical is insuf ...

ic, and have medical and other effects on animals;L. O. Hanus, P. Goldshlag, V. M. Dembitsky (2008). IDENTIFICATION OF CYCLOPROPYL FATTY ACIDS IN WALNUT (JUGLANS REGIA L.) OIL. Biomed Pap Med Fac Univ Palacky Olomouc Czech Repub. 2008, 152(1):41–45. according to this review, "CPFA in food is dangerous to human health". In Vietnam, the tree is called Trôm and its sap is harvested to use as a soft drink called "Mủ Trôm".

Gallery

Pollen of Sterculia foetida (male flower).jpg, Pollen Sterculia foetida MHNT.BOT.2016.12.14.jpg, Follicle and seeds - MHNT Distribution Map Sterculia Foetida.PNG, Points marked in red are known occurrences of ''Stercula foetida'' Starr 080305-3292 Sterculia foetida.jpg, Fruit and leaves Sterculia foetida.webm, leaves and tree 香蘋婆 Sterculia foetida 20210409090402 02.jpg, The flower in the lower part seems to have two styles.

References

{{Taxonbar, from=Q2948337 foetida Trees of China Trees of Indo-China Trees of Malesia Trees of Hawaii Flora of Ghana Trees of Australia Flora of Mozambique Flora of Togo Biofuels Dioecious plants Flora without expected TNC conservation status