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US grants patents to medicinal use of kala jeera

Mamata Singh

While the government has started work on the traditional knowledge digital library which will contain information on the medicinal uses of India's traditional plants, a number of herb-related patents continue to be granted in patent offices around the world.

For instance, the United States patent office has granted four patents to the medicinal use of kala jeera by itself or in combination with other herbs.

Two patent applications have been published by the Japanese patent office and one Patent Cooperation Treaty application has also been published. One US application has been filed as a convention application in many countries including Japan, Australia, Canada, Brazil and countries under the PCT.

While these applications need not necessarily be patenting prior art and traditional knowledge, scientists will have to study these patents and check whether they involve commonly known uses of kala jeera, according to the Intellectual Property Rights bulletin of the Technology Information Forecasting and Assessment Council.

Kala jeera or Nigella Sativa is a native of Syria and Lebanon but is also cultivated in India in Assam, Bihar, Himachal Pradesh and Punjab.

Kala jeera is also known as kalonji in Hindi and Gujarati, mugrela in Hindi, nellajeelakaira in Telugu, karunjiragam in Tamil, karejirage in Kannada and karunchiragam in Malayalam.

The herb has been characterised quite well and its characterstics have been well reported in the Wealth of India and the 'Compendium of Indian Medicinal Plants'. It has been found useful for brochospasms, is a powerful gallatugogue, active against E-coli, salmonella, staphy lococcus aurcus, aspergillus flavus and fusarium tenius. It has also been found to show cyto-toxicity against ehrlich asciter carcinoma, Dalton's lymphoma ascites and serama, the bulletin states.

Patents granted for kala jeera include those granted to herbal or pharmaceutical compositions which list its use in treatment of diabetes, hepatitis and for improvement in immune function.

The USPTO has also granted one patent which deals with a pharmaceutical composition for treatment of cancer and other conditions and prevention of side effects of anti-cancer chemotherapy and increasing the immune function.

The patent for treatment of diabetes claims that a herbal composition consisting of 23 per cent by weight dried powdered seeds of kala jeera along with other seeds including foenum-graecums (meethi).

However, here, it is the herbal composition which has been patented, not the herb itself.

Patents in the pipeline include one which claims to treat arthritis and gout and one which can be used for treatment of asthma or eosinophilis.

One patent deals with the composition of Chinese and Japanese herbs with nigella sativa which is effective against dental caries.

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