Health Benefits of Shame Plant/Mimosa Pudica

Mimosa pudica or better known as Putri Malu in Indonesia has many other names. Among them are Action plant, Shame plant, Humble plant, Sensible plant, Sleepy plant or Touch-me-not plant.

This plant comes from the Caribbean region as well as South and Central America. Then it spread and became gulma in Asian regions including India and Indonesia, Micronesia, Australia and some parts of Africa.

Shame plant or Mimosa pudica appears in many Ayurvedic texts, a record of the traditional Indian medical system and has been used for centuries as a herbal plant, especially for the treatment of urogenital disorders, hemorrhoids, dysentery and sinuses and can also be used to treat external wounds by applying it on the surface of the injured skin. This plant is known to have anti-bacterial, anti-venom, anti-vertility, anti-convulsant, anti-depressant, aphrodisiac and various other pharmacological activities (Gupta, 2012).

A study was also carried out in Padang West Sumatra with the research title Testing the Potential of the Leaf Extract of Putri Malu (Mimosa pudica Linn) Growing in Padang as a Vegetative Larvicide Extract against Mortality of the Aedes aegypti Mosquito Larvae (Uji Potensi Ekstrak Daun Putri Malu (Mimosa pudica Linn) yang Tumbuh di Padang sebagai Larvasida Nabati terhadap Mortalitas Larva Nyamuk Aedes aegypti). Through this research, it was concluded that the Mimosa pudica leaf extracts that is growing in Padang has the potential as a larvacide of Aedes aegypti (Al Khalish, Harminarti, & Katar, 2020).