Abstract:
Human has been interacting with plants from the beginning of human existence. Plants
have provided humans with basic needs such as sustenance, firewood, livestock feed, and wood.
Approximately there are over 3 million vascular plants on the earth. As the first vascular plants,
pteridophytes are an ancient lineage, and human beings have been exploring and using taxa from
this lineage for over 2000 years because of their beneficial properties. About 13,600 species of
ferns are distributed in worldwide. In India, Himalayas, Western and Eastern Ghats, and Pachmarhi
Biosphere Reserve are major distribution of pteridophytes. They remain underexplored in ethno
botanical aspects, than any other vascular plants despite being regarded as a valuable component
of healthcare. Cancer is one of the leading causes of death and globally the numbers of cases on
cancer are increasing gradually. Among the anticancer drugs, about 50% come from natural
products as isolated or semisynthetic or related synthetic compounds and plants represent
important source of these substances. Among all the pteridophytes examined, taxa from the
Polypodiaceae, Pteridaceae, Davalliaceae and Aspleniaceae contain more anticancer compounds
like taxol, Vinca alkaloids, camptothecin, podophyllotoxins etc.
