Chapter Four

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2.12.3 Importance of Magnoliaceae
The family is important as an ornamental plant, used as gardening value, and
as herbal plant that can produce some medicinal substances (magnoloid…etc). Bark,
leaf, and fruit teas have been used to treat fevers, rheumatism, and stomach ailments.
The bark from M. officinalis has long been used in traditional Chinese medicine,
where it is known as houpu. In Japan, M. obovata has been used in a similar manner.
The aromatic bark contains magnolol and honokiol, two polyphenolic compounds that
have demonstrated anti-anxiety and anti-angiogenic properties. Magnolia bark also
has been shown to reduce allergic and asthmatic reactions (wikipedia website).
2.13 Fungi on Magnoliaceae
Several studies on the family Magnoliaceae have been investigated, including
morphological systematics (e.g. Maneval, 1912; Roever, 1937; Canright, 1949),
molecular systematics (e.g. Sewell, 1992; Qiu, 1993; Cevallos-Ferriz, 1990, Azuma et
al., 2001; Kim et al., 2001) and phytochemical study (Wilton, 1982; Song, 1995).
However, only few works have focused on fungi on Magnoliaceae (Ahn, 1996,
Promputtha et al., 2002, 2003, 2004a, b, c; 2005b, Kodsueb et al., 2004a, 2006c,
2007b).