Traumatic acid is a monounsaturated dicarboxylic acid

Dicarboxylic acid

Dicarboxylic acids are organic compounds that contain two carboxylic acid functional groups. In molecular formulae for dicarboxylic acids, these groups are often written as HOOC-R-COOH, where R may be an alkyl, alkenyl, alkynyl, or aryl group...

 naturally occurring in plants. The compound was first isolated from wounded bean plants by American chemists James English Jr. and James Frederick Bonner and Dutch scientist Arie Jan Haagen-Smit

Arie Jan Haagen-Smit

Arie Jan Haagen-Smit was a Dutch chemist. He is best known for linking the smog in Southern California to automobiles and is therefore known by many as the "father" of air pollution control. After serving as an original board member of the Motor Vehicle Pollution Control Board, formed in 1960 to...

 in 1939. Traumatic acid is a potent wound healing agent in plants ("wound hormone") that stimulates cell division near a trauma site to form a protective callus and to heal the damaged tissue. It may also act as a growth hormone

Plant hormone

Plant hormones are chemicals that regulate plant growth, which, in the UK, are termed 'plant growth substances'. Plant hormones are signal molecules produced within the plant, and occur in extremely low concentrations. Hormones regulate cellular processes in targeted cells locally and, when moved...

, especially in inferior plants (e.g. algae

Algae

Algae are a large and diverse group of simple, typically autotrophic organisms, ranging from unicellular to multicellular forms, such as the giant kelps that grow to 65 meters in length. They are photosynthetic like plants, and "simple" because their tissues are not organized into the many...

). Traumatic acid is biosynthesized in plants by non-enzymatic oxidation of traumatin

Traumatin

Traumatin is a plant hormone produced in response to wound. Traumatin is a precursor to the related hormone traumatic acid....

 (12-oxo-trans-10-dodecenoic acid), another wound hormone.

At normal conditions, traumatic acid is a solid, crystalline, water insoluble substance.

Traumatic acid is used as an intermediate in prostaglandin

Prostaglandin

A prostaglandin is any member of a group of lipid compounds that are derived enzymatically from fatty acids and have important functions in the animal body. Every prostaglandin contains 20 carbon atoms, including a 5-carbon ring....

synthesis. It is also a constituent of some pharmaceutical products, such as the odontostomatologic gel Restomyl, due to its mucosal re-epithelialization activity.