Nutritional and medicinal properties of underexploited legume trees from West Africa.

This review concerns three legume trees (family Fabaceae, subfamily Caesalpinioideae) from West Africa, namely , and , and illustrates their nutritional value and therapeutic properties. These species are an important source of nutrition for West African populations, but their agricultural exploitation is still incomplete. The survey was conducted on Scopus, Web of Science, and Medline, using scientific and common English names of the species as keywords and then selecting papers related to nutritional and medicinal properties.

The bioactivity of Hedysarum coronarium extracts on skin enzymes and cells correlates with phenolic content.

Context: The search for bioactive compounds from botanical sources is attracting much interest. However, differences in chemical composition may occur within the same species depending on different geographical origins.

Objectives: We evaluated the properties on skin enzymes and cells of extracts from sulla legume crop Hedysarum coronarium L.