Euphorbia resinifera
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Euphorbia resinifera (Resin spurge) is a species of spurge native to Morocco, where it occurs on the slopes of the Atlas Mountains.Huxley, A, ed. (1992). New RHS Dictionary of Gardening. ISBN 0-333-47494-5It is a shrub growing to 60 cm tall, forming multi-stemmed cushion-shaped clumps up to 2 m wide. The stems are erect, succulent, superficially like a cactus (an example of convergent evolution in a similar semi-desert climate), four-angled, with short but sharp pairs of 6 mm spines on the angles, spaced about 1 cm apart up the stem.It is similar to its relative Euphorbia echinus, which occurs on the Moroccan coast and the Canary Islands.It contains a high concentration of resiniferatoxin and is being used to develop a novel and powerful class of analgesics.Appendino, G. & Szallasi, A. (1997) Euphorbium: Modern research on its active principle, resiniferatoxin, revives an ancient medicine. [http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/S0024-3205(96)00567-X]
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