LUFFA ACUTANGULA (Linn.) Roxb.                                                                           PATOLA

Cucumis acutangulus Linn.

Luffa foetida Cav.

Local names: patola (Tag.); patula-baibing (Sul.); saykua (Bis.).

Patola is commonly cultivated here for its edible fruit, but is not established. It is in cultivation in the Old World Tropics. 

This vegetable is a coarse, annual, herbaceous vine. The leaves are subrounded-ovate, 10 to 20 centimeters long, shallowly 5-lobed, and heart-shaped at the base. The female fowlers are pedicelled, occurring singly in the axils of the leaves. The male flowers are yellow, 2 centimeters long, and borne in axillary racemes. The calyx-lobes are lanceolate and pointed. The fruit is oblong-oblanceolate, 20 to 25 centimeters long, about 5 centimeters in diameter, green, and characterized by 10, prominent, longitudinal, sharp angles. The seeds are numerous and close-packed.

Patola is a common vegetable sold in the markets. It is cooked with other vegetables or alone with shrimps and pork. The fibrous network of the mature fruit, devoid of the pulp and cleaned, is used as a bath brush or sponge. Analyses of the unripe fruit show it is good source of calcium and iron and an excellent source of phosphorus. According to Hermano and Sepulveda the fruit is a fair source of vitamin B.

Wehmer affirms that the fruit contains an amorphous bitter principle, luffeine. The seeds contain a fixed oil which consists of the glycerides of palmitic, stearic, and myristic acids.

According to Kobert the root is used as a purge in Russia. Nadkarni says that in India the root is laxative and is used in dropsy.

Burkill quotes van Dongen [Bekn. Overtz. Geneesmidd. Ned. Oost Ind. (1913) 174], who says that a decoction of the leaves is used in Java for uraemia and amenorrhea. Nadkarni reports that the leaves are applied locally in splenitis, hemorrhoids, and leprosy. The juice of the fresh leaves is dropped into the eyes of children in granular conjunctivitis, and also prevent the lids from adhering at night on account of adrenal variety of diabetes. Dymock, Warden, and Hooper says that the juice of the leaves is used as an external application to sores and the bites of venomous animals. 

Nadkarni adds that an infusion of the ripe fruit (1 in 80) is used in doses of one to two ounces, 20 to 30 grains of the dried kernel. The oil of the seeds is used in skin complaints. Hooper states that in Iran and Iraq, the infused seeds are given as a purgative and an emetic. Dymock, Warden, and Hooper record that the pulp of the fruit is administered internally to cause vomiting and purging, just as calocynth is used. The dried fruit is powdered and made into a snuff for those suffering from jaundice.