High Quality Bitter Almond

Bitter Almond, alias: Almond. PRUNUS ARMENIACA L. Var. Ansu Maxim. . PRUNUS SIBIRICA L. , Prunus MANDSHURICA (maximum.) Koehne or PRUNUS ARMENIACA L. Dried mature seeds of Amomum villosum. Harvest Ripe Fruit in summer, remove pulp and Shell, take out the seeds, drying. Its main function is to reduce Qi, relieve cough and asthma, moisten intestine and relieve constipation. For coughing, wheezing, chest full of phlegm, blood deficiency, intestinal dryness and constipation. Main production Inner Mongolia, Jilin, Liaoning, Hebei, Shanxi, Shaanxi. Almonds are divided into sweet almond and bitter almond two kinds. Almond produced in southern China is a sweet almond (also known as South Almond) , taste slightly sweet, delicate, mostly used for food, but also as raw materials to join the cake, cookies and dishes.

Characteristics: deciduous trees, up to 6M high. Leaves Alternate, broadly ovate or ovoid, 5-10 cm long, 3.5-6 cm wide, apex mucronate or acuminate, base rounded, margin serrulate or inconspicuous double serrate; petiole mostly Reddish, with 2 glands. Flowers solitary, leaves opening, hardly pedicellate; Sepals 5, flowers reflexed; Petals 5, White or pink; stamens numerous; carpels 1, pubescent. Drupe suborbicular, Ca. 3 cm in Diam. , orange-yellow; Drupe Hard, oblate-cordate, furrowed along ventral suture. FLOWERING: 3 ~ 4 MONTHS, FRUITING: 5 ~ 6 months. Harvest the ripe fruit in summer, remove the pulp and core shell, take out the seeds to dry in the sun.

The bitter almond contains Amygdalin, which can be hydrolyzed by the intestinal microorganism enzyme or the bitter almond enzyme contained in the bitter almond itself to produce trace amount of hydrocyanic acid and Benzaldehyde, which can inhibit the sucking center, to achieve antitussive, antiasthmatic effect. "Herbs for truth" records that "almonds, both the wind and cold can send out the power of the next breath except asthma" . Good at relieving cough, removing Phlegm and relieving asthma, the main symptoms of lung system cough, phlegm, wheezing and have a strong targeted, so ancient and modern doctors will use it as lung medicine, regardless of internal injury and external feeling, new chronic disease, where the lung, the use of more. In the experiment of Guinea pig organ in vitro, the aqueous extract of almond can reduce the sensitivity of organ to ammonia stimulation, antagonize the excitation of Histamine, Acetylcholine and Barium chloride on tracheal smooth muscle, and has obvious antitussive effect. SO2-induced cough method was used to study the inhibitory effect of Amygdalin 1 mg/kg, 10 mg/kg and 100 mg/kg for 30 min on cough frequency in mice. The inhibitory rates were 26% , 22.8% and 25.3% respectively. The effect of 48.3 mg/kg extract of semen Armeniacae Amarum by gavage was 39.7% stronger than that of the same amount of Amygdalin. Bitter Almond can promote the synthesis of pulmonary surfactant (PS) and is beneficial to the respiratory function. Bitter Almond can not only promote the synthesis of PS, it can also improve the physiological and biochemical indexes of lung, such as lung homogenate, lung water volume, total phospholipids in bronchial lavage and pathological section.