Dr. Orangutan: A wild ape was seen using a traditional medicine-based plant to relieve pain in a wound

Animals have been documented engaging in a broad variety of self-medication behaviors, such as parrots consuming clay to facilitate digestion and dogs consuming grass to ease digestive distress. Scientists have seen the sap from a climbing plant, which has well-known anti-inflammatory and analgesic qualities and is often used in traditional medicine, being applied by a male Sumatran orangutan who had a face cut. Additionally, the orangutan used a plant mesh to conceal the wound. This is the first time that researchers have seen a wild animal use a medical herb to heal a wound.

It is known that great apes use plant material topically to relieve painful muscles and that they consume certain plants to cure parasite infections. It has also been observed that orangutans treat painful joints using anti-inflammatory drugs. On the other hand, this is the first recorded instance of using a biologically active material to cure wounds.

Around 150 highly endangered Sumatran orangutans live in the protected rainforest of Suaq Balimbing research site in Indonesia, where the study was conducted. Three days after his injury, Rakus, a male orangutan, tore off the leaves of a plant known as Fibraurea tinctoria, also called Akar Kuning, chewed on them, and then applied the liquid to his face wound. The chewed leaves also covered the wound.

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The results have been reported in a study that was published in Nature. “This and related liana species that can be found in Southeast Asian tropical forests are known for their analgesic and antipyretic effects and are used in traditional medicine to treat various diseases, such as malaria,” says Isabelle Laumer, the study’s first author. Furanoditerpenoids and protoberberine alkaloids, which are known to have antibacterial, anti-inflammatory, antifungal, antioxidant, and other biological actions relevant to wound healing, are found in plant chemical analyses.

The study clarifies the evolutionary history of wound care. Scientists believe that humans and orangutans may have had a comparable ointment-applying behavior in the past, and that they may have shared an underlying mechanism for identifying and using compounds with medicinal qualities.