Ptaeroxylon
species of plant, Sneeze-wood
Ptaeroxylon obliquum is the botanical name for the sneezewood tree. It is native to Southern Africa, including South Africa, Zimbabwe, and Mozambique. It is the only species in the genus Ptaeroxylon.
Background
Ptaeroxylon obliquum is a species from the family Rutaceae which are most abundant in South Africa and Australia. The term ptaeroxylon is Greek for sneeze and wood, while obliquum denotes the oblique shape of the leaflets. The wood produces oils containing nieshoutol, which causes violent sneeze attacks by workers who are exposed to the tree. Though sneezewood is not poisonous, it has been known to cause respiratory complications. It has been linked to asthma, rhinitis and mucosal inflammation.
Description
Ptaeroxylon obliquum is a shrub or medium deciduous tree that stands up to 15 metres (49 ft) tall.
The bark is whitish-grey and smooth when young, but fissured with age.
Begin with the source’s own compact description: “Ptaeroxylon” is species of plant, Sneeze-wood. The dossier treats that line as a proposition to test through Ptaeroxylon, species and plant, not as a finished interpretation.
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Datasets, specimens, observations and peer-reviewed methods provide the appropriate test for the technical claims summarized here. The source revision retrieved here is dated Mar 22, 2024. The linked authority identifier is Q311852. None of the 0 selected statements returned an explicit reference.
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This entry incorporates text from “Ptaeroxylon” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.