Castor, considered an 'energy plant', contains deadly toxins, have you ever seen it?

Castor bean has strong vitality and adaptability. When I was young, in the village where my hometown was located, whenever there was a small open space in front of the house and behind the house, the villagers would plant castor bean. It is really everywhere. And castor plant is very adaptable, and it can grow vigorously with a similar piece of land. When I was a child, I didn't know that castor beans were poisonous, and I often picked them off and threw them on my friends, because the outside of castor beans was wrapped with small thorns that could stick to clothes. I used to pick them to play.

Why did many people grow castor beans in the countryside before?

This is because the castor is a treasure all over the body. For example, the bark of the castor can be used to make hemp ropes. In our hometown, even children knew how to make hemp ropes, and the hemp ropes made are very strong and durable.

Castor bean is one of the top ten oil crops in the world, and it can also be called an "energy plant". Castor bean contains rich oil components. Even under ordinary production processes, the oil yield can reach about 45%. Castor oil is a viscous, pale yellow, non-volatile, non-drying oil with very good biodegradability. Because it comes from plants, it is very environmentally friendly. Castor oil prepared from castor oil has high burning point, low freezing point and large specific gravity, so it is often used as a natural lubricant in various fields such as chemical industry, light industry, electromechanical and so on. And especially the refined castor oil can also be used in aerospace and military industries.

Castor leaves can be used to make environmentally friendly insecticides and insecticides. This is because the castor leaves contain toxic substances such as ricin and ricin. The castor leaves can be dried and ground into powder, and then added. With enough water, it can be made into a natural insecticide.

In addition, castor can also be used as medicine. From these aspects, it is no exaggeration to say that castor is a treasure.

Although castor has high economic value, there are deadly toxins hidden in the castor plant. The most poisonous part is the castor bean. As the seeds of castor, it contains ricin and ricin which are toxic to the human body. Ricin is the most toxic to the human body and is one of the strongest natural toxins. Studies have shown that ricin is toxic to all mammals.

Some data show that even if it is raw castor seeds in the wild, children may die if ingested 2-7 seeds by mistake, adults may die if ingested 20 seeds by mistake, and ingestion of castor beans will lead to poisoning, and the incubation period after poisoning is also very long. Most of the symptoms start 3-24 hours after eating by mistake. The symptoms are: fever, vomiting, nausea, abdominal pain, diarrhea, throat irritation, severe fever, blood in the stool, dehydration and acidosis. The patient is accompanied by drowsiness, headache , convulsions, proteinuria, hematuria and other symptoms.

So far, there is no effective antidote, and only symptomatic treatment can be based on the cause. Therefore, the cause should be identified as soon as possible before treatment, otherwise the best time for treatment will be delayed. After it is determined that it is ricin poisoning, gastric lavage and drainage are performed as soon as possible, and fluids are added to diuresis at the same time, and blood perfusion technology is used to eliminate toxins in the body as much as possible to achieve the purpose of treatment.

Because ricin is easy to prepare, this strong natural toxin can easily be used by terrorists to carry out sabotage activities, and may also be made into a highly destructive toxin warfare agent weapon. In the late 1970s, a BBC reporter was assassinated. The weapon used by the murderer was a poison made from ricin. The murderer put the poison into a special assassination weapon umbrella, and the murderer pretended to bend over to pick it up. When taking up the umbrella, a small cylinder the size of a needle is shot out. The small cylinder contains ricin, which releases the toxin after entering the human body to achieve the purpose of assassination. According to the autopsy results, the cause of the death of the BBC reporter was simply because he was injected. About 0.45mg of ricin, it can be seen how poisonous the purified ricin is.