Anxiety disorders and schizophrenia are common public health issues. The dried stigma of the plant Crocus sativus L., (C. sativus) commonly known as saffron are used in folk medicine for various purposes. Several lines of evidence suggest that C. sativus, crocins and safranal are implicated in anxiety and schizophrenia. Here, I intend to critically review advances in research of these emerging ...

Evidence Based Medicine (EBM) is now generally perceived to be the dominant operating system in conventional medicine. It is unsurprising then that some have counseled complementary and alternative medicine practitioners to resist EBM . The efficacy of medicinal herbs does need to be established and toxicity, contraindications and side effects also need to be investigated, and this is best done...

Cultural diversity and biodiversity are strongly intertwined through the ways in which local human communities have understood, categorized, perceived, used nature species for centuries. Folk nomenclature uses of wild plants particular linked to specific ethno-diversities often been considered as cultural markers. In current study, thirty-one interviews with elderly villagers, ethnobotany five ...

To study the mechanism(s) of the relaxant effects of Crocus sativus (Iridaceae), the stimulatory effect of aqueous-ethanolic extracts of this plant and one of its constituent, safranal was examined on beta-adrenoceptors in tracheal chains of guinea pigs. The beta(2)-adrenergic stimulatory was tested by performing the cumulative concentration-response curves of isoprenaline-induced relaxation of...

A collaboration between the University of Florida and the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology, Lausanne (EPFL) has been formed to develop and validate detailed coupled multiphysics models of the zero-power (100 W) CROCUS reactor at EPFL and the 100 kW University of Florida Training Reactor, for the comprehensive analysis of the reactor behavior under transient (neutronic or thermal-hydraulic ...