Thread: Safflower, bastard saffron, insulin production

Tried to copy picture from wiki but does not work...

The Safflower is often sold in Asia, as Saffron.
Big bags of few kilos should make it suspicious but what is important for the stalls in Chinatown is to sale and if it can be sold at high price to a foreigner, then yes it is Saffron...

This flower is now planted in Australia as second crop of the year, a bit like the sunflower the plant is used for the seeds to make oil, margarine and such...

One biochemist of Calgary succeeded few years ago to modify the plant with human tissues. The plant can now produce insulin.

Over 200 million diabetics of the planet need injections on daily basis...

All is still in development and test phase but this new way of using plants can be
a turn into using plants for the humans medication need.


Kingdom: Plantae
(unranked): Angiosperms
(unranked): Eudicots
(unranked): Asterids
Order: Asterales
Family: Asteraceae
Tribe: Cynareae
Genus: Carthamus
Species: C. tinctorius
Binomial name Carthamus tinctorius
(Mohler, Roth, Schmidt & Boudreaux, 1967)[citation needed]

Yes, the safflower plant and the plant from which saffron is derived are 2 different plants.

Here some pictures of the two:



Carthamus tinctorius




Crocus sativa

The main topic of the thread is more info about producing insulin to be used by humans and the new technologies to use plants to grow new types of medicines...

Thanks anyway to show the difference beetween and picture of a saffron flower and the safflower...