Podophyllum is a genus of six species of herbaceous

Herbaceous

A herbaceous plant is a plant that has leaves and stems that die down at the end of the growing season to the soil level. They have no persistent woody stem above ground...

 perennial plant

Perennial plant

A perennial plant or simply perennial is a plant that lives for more than two years. The term is often used to differentiate a plant from shorter lived annuals and biennials. The term is sometimes misused by commercial gardeners or horticulturalists to describe only herbaceous perennials...

s in the family Berberidaceae

Berberidaceae

Berberidaceae are a family of 15 genera flowering plants commonly called the barberry family. This family is in the order Ranunculales. The family contains about 570 species, of which the majority are in Berberis...

, native to eastern Asia

Asia

Asia is the world's largest and most populous continent, located primarily in the eastern and northern hemispheres. It covers 8.7% of the Earth's total surface area and with approximately 3.879 billion people, it hosts 60% of the world's current human population...

 (five species) and eastern North America

North America

North America is a continent wholly within the Northern Hemisphere and almost wholly within the Western Hemisphere. It is also considered a northern subcontinent of the Americas...

 (one species, Mayapple P. peltatum). They are woodland plants, typically growing in colonies

Clonal colony

A clonal colony or genet is a group of genetically identical individuals that have grown in a given location, all originating vegetatively from a single ancestor. In plants, an individual in such a population is referred to as a ramet...

 derived from a single root.

The stems grow to 30–40 cm tall, with palmately lobed umbrella-like leaves

Leaf

A leaf is an organ of a vascular plant, as defined in botanical terms, and in particular in plant morphology. Foliage is a mass noun that refers to leaves as a feature of plants....

 up to 20–40 cm diameter with 3–9 shallowly to deeply cut lobes. The plants produce several stems from a creeping underground rhizome

Rhizome

In botany and dendrology, a rhizome is a characteristically horizontal stem of a plant that is usually found underground, often sending out roots and shoots from its nodes...

; some stems bear a single leaf and do not produce any flower

Flower

A flower, sometimes known as a bloom or blossom, is the reproductive structure found in flowering plants . The biological function of a flower is to effect reproduction, usually by providing a mechanism for the union of sperm with eggs...

 or fruit

Fruit

In broad terms, a fruit is a structure of a plant that contains its seeds.The term has different meanings dependent on context. In non-technical usage, such as food preparation, fruit normally means the fleshy seed-associated structures of certain plants that are sweet and edible in the raw state,...

, while flowering stems produce a pair or more leaves with 1–8 flowers in the axil between the apical leaves. The flowers are white, yellow or red, 2–6 cm diameter with 6–9 petals, and mature into a green, yellow or red fleshy fruit 2–5 cm long.

All the parts of the plant, excepting the fruit, are poisonous. Even the fruit, though not dangerously poisonous, can cause unpleasant indigestion.

The substance they contain (podophyllotoxin

Podophyllotoxin

Podophyllotoxin , otherwise known as podofilox, is a non-alkaloid toxin lignan extracted from the roots and rhizomes of Podophyllum species. Under the trade name Condylox, a topical gel, it is used on the skin to treat external genital warts, caused by some types of the human papillomavirus...

 or podophyllin) is used as a purgative and as a cytostatic. Posalfilin is a drug containing podophyllin and salicylic acid

Salicylic acid

Salicylic acid is a monohydroxybenzoic acid, a type of phenolic acid and a beta hydroxy acid. This colorless crystalline organic acid is widely used in organic synthesis and functions as a plant hormone. It is derived from the metabolism of salicin...

 that is used to treat the plantar wart

Plantar wart

-External links:* at the Mayo Clinic website* at The Merck Manual* at dermnet.com...

.

They are also grown as ornamental plant

Ornamental plant

Ornamental plants are plants that are grown for decorative purposes in gardens and landscape design projects, as house plants, for cut flowers and specimen display...

s for their attractive foliage and flowers.

Species

• Podophyllum aurantiocaule. Southwest China (Yunnan).
• Podophyllum delavayi
  Podophyllum delavayi
  Podophyllum delavayi is a herbaceous perennial plant native to Southwest China that is highly sought after by plant collectors and avid shade gardeners. It is distinguished by its lobed, peltate foliage that is remarkably mottled when it first emerges in early spring...
  
  . Southwest China.
• Podophyllum hexandrum
  Podophyllum hexandrum
  The perennial herb Podophyllum hexandrum , bearing the common names Himalayan mayapple or Indian may apple, is native to the lower elevations in and surrounding the Himalaya. It is low to the ground with glossy green, drooping, lobed leaves on its few stiff branches, and it bears a pale pink...
  
  . Western China, Himalaya.
• Podophyllum peltatum - Mayapple. Eastern North America.
• Podophyllum pleianthum. Central and southeast China.
• Podophyllum versipelle. China, Tibet.