Spreading Diamond Flower is a slender annual herb,
rising up to prostrate, up to 50 cm tall; stems slightly flattened to
round or young stems sometimes 4-angled, sparsely to densely finely
velvet-hairy. Leaves are stalkless or nearly stalkless; blade drying
membranous, linear, narrowly elliptic, or narrowly
inverted-lanceshaped, 1-4 x 0.1-0.4 cm, above hairless and smooth or
often rough near margins, below hairless to rough, base pointed,
margins usually curled at least when dry, tip pointed; secondary veins
not visible. Flowers are borne in leaf-axils, either singly or 2
fascicled, hairless, stalked. Flower-cluster-stalks or flower-stalks
are 4-20 mm. Calyx is hairless, cup portion somewhat spherical, 1-1.2
mm; limb lobed essentially to base; lobes narrowly triangular, 1-2 mm,
ciliolate. Flowers are white, tubular, outside hairless; tube 1.5-2.5
mm, hairless inside; petals ovate-oblong, 1.2-2 mm. Anthers are about
0.8 mm, protruding. Stigma about 1.2 mm, protruding. Fruits are
capsular, compressed spherical to oblate, 2-3 × 2-3 mm. Spreading
Diamond Flower is found in Andaman Is.; Bangladesh; Borneo; China
South-Central; China Southeast; East Himalaya; Hainan; Western Ghats,
Japan; Jawa; Korea; Lesser Sunda Is.; Malaya; Myanmar; Nansei-shoto;
Nepal; Nicobar Is.; Philippines; Sri Lanka; Sumatera; Taiwan; Thailand;
Vietnam. Flowering: May-October.
Medicinal uses: Spreading Diamond Flower is
being actively studied for its role in treating cancer.
Identification credit: Thingnam Rajshree
Photographed in Navi Mumbai, Maharashtra.
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The flower labeled Spreading Diamond Flower is ...