Investigate the contemporary application of Aboriginal protocols

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Investigate the contemporary application of Aboriginal protocols in the development of particular medicines and biological materials in Australia and how recognition and protection of Indigenous cultural and intellectual property is important, for example:

• bush medicine
• smoke bush in Western Australia

Bush Medicine:

• Bush medicines are made from herbal extracts and is the sum of the total knowledge, skills and practices based on the theories, beliefs and experiences indigenous to different cultures, whether explicable or not, used in the maintenance of health as well as in the prevention, diagnosis, improvement or treatment of physical and mental illness.
• Bush medicines are a part of the indigenous culture and though approaches of modern medicine and aboriginal medicine have different approach, bush medicines are still used to treat basic diseases and at times for first aid.
• Traditions in southern and eastern Australia have largely been lost, but efforts are being made by anthropologists to record traditions from Aborigines in central and north-western Australia.
• Bush medicines serve as raw materials for some drugs that are developed using modern pharmaceutical techniques. When bush medicines are used as raw materials, they are known as “Crude Drugs”.
• Some bush medicines used in Australia are given below:
• Tea tree oil (Melaleuca alternifolia)
• Bundjalung Aboriginal people from the coast of New South Wales crushed tea-tree (or paper bark) leaves and applied the paste to wounds as well as brewing it to a kind of tea for throat ailments.
• In the 1920s, scientific experiments proved that the tea-tree oil’s antiseptic potency was far stronger than the commonly used antiseptic of the time. Since then, the oil has been used to treat everything from fungal infections of the toenails to acne.
• Eucalyptus oil (Eucalyptus sp.)
• Eucalyptus leaves can be infused for body pains and fevers and chills.
• Today the oil is used commercially in mouthwash, throat lozenges and cough suppressants.
• Billy goat plum/Kakadu plum (Terminalia ferdinandiana)
• The world’s richest source of Vitamin C is found in this native fruit from the woodlands of the Northern Territory and Western Australia. The plum has 50 times the Vitamin C of oranges, and was a major source of food for tribes in the areas where it grows.
• Desert mushrooms (Pycnoporus sp.)
• Some Aboriginal people suck on the bright orange desert mushroom to cure a sore mouth or lips.
• It has been known to be a kind of natural teething ring, and is also useful for babies with oral thrush.
• Emu bush (Eremophila sp.)
• Concoctions of emu bush leaves were used by Northern Territory Aboriginal tribes to wash sores and cuts; occasionally it was gargled.
• In the last decade, leaves from the plant were found to have the same strength as some established antibiotics.
• Witchetty (Witjuti) grub (Endoxyla leucomochla)
• Witchetty (Witjuti) grubs also a good source of bush tucker was crushed into a paste, placed on burns and covered with a bandage to seal and soothe the skin by some people in Central Australia.
• Snake vine (Tinospora smilacina)
• Communities in Central Australia used to crush sections of the vine to treat headaches, rheumatoid arthritis and other inflammatory-related ailments.
• The sap and leaves were sometimes used to treat sores and wounds.
• Sandpaper Fig and Stinking Passion Flower (Ficus opposita) / (Passiflora foetida)
• The combination the two plants were used in northern coastal communities to relieve itching. The rough leaves of the sandpaper fig were crushed and soaked in water, the rubbed on the itch until it bled.
• The pulped fruit of the stinking passion flower was then smeared on to the affected area.
• Sandpaper fig leaves have also been used to treat fungal skin infections such as ringworm, sometimes in combination with the milky sap.
• Kangaroo apple (Solanum laciniatum and Solanum aviculare)
• The fruit was used as a poultice on swollen joints. The plant contains a steroid which is important to the production of cortisone.
• Goat’s foot (Ipomoea pes-caprae)
• For pain relief from sting ray and stone fish stings, mobs from northern Australia and parts of New South Wales, crushed and heated the leaves of the plant, then applied them directly to the skin. Goat’s foot is common near sandy shorelines across Australia.

Smoke Bush in Western Australia:

• Conospermum sp. commonly known as Smokebush are a group of endemic shrubs in Western Australia.
• They offer a wide diversity of flower types, ranging from white to blue and flowering from summer to winter.
• They are almost entirely picked from natural populations and exported fresh or dried to Japan, Europe and the USA.
• Although not common in horticulture, some members of the genus Conospermum, especially the Western Australian smoke bushes are particularly attractive. The western species are difficult to propagate and the eastern ones are not of great horticultural potential.
• Four species—summer smokebush (C. crassinervium), plume smokebush (C. incurvum), common smokebush (C. stoechadis) and tree smokebush (C. triplinervium)—are used in the cut flower industry. Mostly harvested from the wild, they are difficult to cultivate, although information on growing 6 species on a commercial scale is available.
• Some species of smokebush are reducing in numbers. Loss of endemic plants can be minimized by adapting lab techniques to promote yield.

Extract from HSC Biology Stage 6 Syllabus. © 2017 Board of Studies NSW.