heres some more of the same info but someting instering at the end.
Synonyms: Male Fern.
• Family: Aspidiaceae.
• Range: Asia, Siberia, Greece, India, N. America.
• Botany description: It makes a very lovely houseplant. Plant has broad fronds, 6 to 10 inches long. Leaves monomorphic, green through winter, 6--40 × 1--6 cm, old leaves persistent as gray or brown conspicuous clump at plant base (only in this species). Petiole 1/3 length of leaf, scaly throughout; scales dense, brown to red-brown. Blades green, linear-lanceolate, pinnate-pinnatifid to 2-pinnate, papery, densely scaly (only in this species) abaxially, glandular, aromatic when handled (only in this species). Pinnae ± in plane of blade, linear-oblong; basal pinnae linear-oblong, much reduced, basal pinnules longer than adjacent pinnules, basal basiscopic pinnule and basal acroscopic pinnule equal; pinnule margins crenately toothed. Sori midway between midvein and margin of segments. Indusia glandular. Root is long obovate, slightly curved, the upper end obtuse or truncate, the lower end acuminate, some cut longitudinally into two pieces, 7-20 cm long, 4-8 cm in diameter. Externally yellowish-brown to black brown, densely covered with regularly arranged frond-bases and ramenta, and with curved rootlets. The frond bases oblate rounded 3-5 cm long, 5-10 mm in diameter, externally with longitudinal edge, texture hard and fragile, fracture slight smooth, brown and showing 5-13 yellowish white meristeles arranged in a ring. The outside of each frond base with three rootlet respectivly, ramenta striped lanceolate, entire, usually fallen off, texture hard, fracture slight smooth, dark green to brown, with 5-13 yellowish-white meristele ranged in a ring, relatively more leaf trace bundles scattered in the outer part. Odour characteristic; taste, firstly slight astringent and then gradually bitter or pungent.
• Chemical composition: Three new kaempferol glycosides, called crassirhizomosides A (1), B (2) and C (3), were isolated from the rhizome of Dryopteris crassirhizoma (Aspidiaceae), together with the known kaempferol glycoside, sutchuenoside A (4). The structures of 1-3 were determined as kaempferol 3-alpha-L-(2,4-di-O-acetyl)rhamnopyranoside-7-alpha-L-rhamnopyranoside, kaempferol 3-alpha-L-(3,4-di-O-acetyl)rhamnopyranoside, and kaempferol 3-alpha-L-(2,3-di-O-acetyl)rhamnopyranosside-7-alpha-L-rhamnopyranoside, respectively, by chemical and spectroscopic means. Inhibitory effects of 1-4 and kaempferol on human immunodeficiency virus reverse transcriptase-associated DNA polymerase (RNA-dependent DNA polymerase and DNA-dependent DNA polymerase) and RNase H activities were investigated (Min, 2001).
Two new ichthyotoxic compounds, aspidin PB (8) and dryofragin (9), along with three known phloroglucinol derivatives (1-3) and five terpenoids, were isolated from the whole herbs of Dryopteris fragrans(Ito,2000).
The two dimeric compounds aspidin and desaspidin, which were found to be the most active among the tested phlorophenones, were also examined in vivo on two stage mouse skin carcinogenesis, and found to show significant inhibitory effect on 7,12-dimethylbenz[alpha]anthracene (DMBA)-TPA tumor promotion(Kapadia,1996).
• Part Used: Root.
• Medicinal Uses: In male mice and rats, one drop of an extract from Dryopteris filix mas, administered orally pure or suspended in sunflower-seed oil, caused a spectacular enlargement of the penis. This unexpected effect cannot be explained so far and will have to be elucidated by further experiments (Kantemir, 1976).Aspidin and desaspidin inhibit TPA induced tumors in mice(Kapadia 1996) .
Shows antibiotic properties of the male fern (Aizenman 1973).
Effect of desaspidin on photosynthetic phosphorylation and related processes(Hind 1966).
