Mauritius papeda, leech lime, kafir lime (English); Limau purut (Malay)
Whole fruit, juice or peel
The juice of the fruit is used for seasoning and to prepare drinks and as an insecticide for washing the head and treating the feet to kill land leeches. Leaves are commonly used to season food in South-East Asia.
Fresh processed- essential oil
As edible agricultural produce–Ministry of Agriculture and Agriculture-based Industry
Essential oils is extracted for the production of toiletries and personal care products such as hand wash, body shampoo and hair shampoo.
Citrus hystrix is better known for the use of its fruit for culinary purposes. It is used as a traditional medicine for stomachache caused by dyspepsia (Gimlette and Thomson, 1983). It is planted around the house compound or in pots in urban homes. The leaves are used in the preparation of Thai and Malay dishes. The fruit juice is an expectorant and is antidandruff. The fruit is used to heal swollen gums. The rind can relieve gastralgia and acts as a carminative. It is used to expel worms from children and to relieve headaches. It is also a necessary ingredient in most Malay tonic medicines. Together with ginger and other aromatics, it is used as a bolus to treat postpartum septicaemia.
Murakami et al., 1999, showed that the inhibitory activity of bergamottin (IC50=14 microM) of both lipopolysaccharide (LPS) and interferon-gamma (IFN-gamma)-induced nitric oxide (NO) generation in RAW 264.7 cells was comparable to that of N-(iminoethyl)-L-ornithine (L-NIO) (IC(50)=7.9 microM). Essential oil of C. hystrix is less effective in repelling mosquitoes compared to turmeric and citronella grass (Tawatsin et al., 2001).
β-pinene, limonene, terpinen-4-ol and α-terpineol are some of the components identified from the essential oil. The essential oils were mainly made up of monoterpenoids with sabinene, β-pinene and limonene as the most abundant chemical components. The fruit peel oil comprised of sabinene (21.5%) and β –pinene (19.0%) as the major constituents. It also contained significant amounts of limonene (15.3%) and terpinen-4-ol (12.6%). Other chemical compounds present were α-terpineol (5.1%), citronellol (2.9%), γ-terpinene (2.7%), cis-linalool oxide (2.4%) and α-pinene (2.4%). Similarly, the essential oils of the whole fruit oil were made up of sabinene (14.0%), limonene (15.0%), terpinen-4-ol (15.0%) and β-pinene (13.4%). Other chemical compounds present in appreciable amounts were α-terpineol (9.8%), γ-terpinene (4.0%), cis-linalool oxide (3.6%), isopulegol (3.3%) and trans-linalool oxide (3.1%). The fruit and peel oils of C. hystrix possess a fresh sharp sweet smelling lemon-like citrusy aroma with the fruit oil aroma seems to be much milder. Three coumarins, bergamottin, oxypeucedanin and 5-[(6',7'-dihydroxy-3', 7'-dimethyl-2-octenyl)oxy] psoralen have been reported to occur in C. hystrix.
There are reports of phytophotodermatitis caused by psoralens from the juice of C. hystrix (Koh and Ong, 1999; Ernst, 2000).