This is one of the world's most ancient crops that has been in use since before we even recorded
history. This plant seed may harmlessly adorn your morning bagel, its flowers may bring a pop of color
to your garden but its milk is at the heart of one of today's major health crises. This is the Opium Poppy.
Hey! I'm Tasha the Amazon and you're watching Floralogic. Papaver Somniferum,
otherwise known as the Opium poppy or Breadseed poppy, is as essential for humanity as
it is deadly. The Opium poppy is a self-pollinating annual that grows to be up to a meter and a half
tall. It belongs to the Papaveraceae family, a group of over 800 flowering plant species spread
over 44 genera, most of which are herbaceous but with a few woody shrubs and some small tropical
trees mixed in to keep it interesting. Most species of this family are popular garden flowers with
beautiful blooms ranging from white to pink and red to orange or purple and yellow. The tiny seeds
of these plants share a common dispersal method: they are shaken out by the wind through holes in
the top of their dried seed capsules. People have been purposely planting poppies for a very, very
long time... since even before recorded history, humans have known the power of the poppy. There
is plenty of evidence of opium poppy cultivation all over Europe, the Mediterranean, and West Asia as
far back as 6000 BCE during the Neolithic era. This abundance of evidence actually makes it harder to
pinpoint the exact location of first cultivation, but scientists believe that the opium poppy is
native to the Anatolian Peninsula or Mesopotamia, which is now modern-day Turkey, Iraq, and Kuwait.
At first, the seeds were just used as a food source, but around 1500 BCE, the ancient Greeks made note
of the drowsing effect of this plant. Somniferum, in fact, means "sleep bringing" in Latin. The poppy
family is lactiferous. This may sound like a way of saying awesomely milky, but lactiferous actually
means that they produce natural latex. This latex is either clear, colored or white and milky, like
the latex of the opium poppy. Plant latex is a sap that's stored in tube-like network structure
called laticifer, made up of highly specialized cells all over the plant, except in the seeds.
When lacerated, the laticifer leaks latex. How's that for some alluring alliteration?
The compounds in the latex act as a natural defense against microbes and insects. The
drugs heroin, morphine, and codeine are also derived from this latex. Both the food and
pharmaceutical industries harvest their wares from the same part of the plant: the seed capsule.
For the opioid, the latex is harvested five to ten days after the petals have fallen off while it's
still unripe. Timing is everything: if harvested too early, the latex is watery, and too late, and
it starts to lose its potency. Once dried, the latex turns from milky white to deep brown
and it's about 10% morphine. It's this latex that is the basis for a host of opioid drugs.
If left to fully mature, the plant forms poppy seeds inside the capsules which can be harvested
for yummy, yummy snacks. Since the seeds form after the latex, it was thought that poppy seeds do not
contain any opioid alkaloids. That was until the late 70s when it was discovered you could fail a
drug urine test after consuming poppy seed bread. It turns out that while poppy seeds themselves
don't contain opiates, they become contaminated with morphine from the capsules during harvest.
Most opioids are removed during processing but some always remain. Convicts on parole
are sometimes encouraged to avoid poppy seeds altogether to prevent false positive drug tests.
Traces of opioids from poppy seeds can remain in your pee for 48 hours or more. So, if you're having
a drug test, you might want to skip that poppy seed bagel. Dried poppy latex contains two kinds
of opium alkaloids. One type that includes morphine, codeine, and thebaine acts on the central nervous
system. These alkaloids are powerful pain relieving narcotics and are what make opium so dangerously
addictive. The other kind, which includes papaverine and noscapine, are antispasmodic, working to relax
smooth muscles, which are the ones that can't be controlled by conscious thought, like those in the
digestive system. Poppy products like morphine and codeine are essential in hospitals for pain relief,
but, did you know that poppy seeds themselves are also used in medicine? The poppy seed test checks
if there is an abnormal connection between the colon and the bladder. The patient is fed poppy
seeds and are then checked for the next two days to see if one pops up in their pee. Who knew there
was more than one way for poppy seeds to show up in your urine! While useful in medicine, the
darker side of the opium poppy is of course the illicit drug, heroin. In 1898, it was discovered
that morphine treated with the chemical compound acidic anhydride would yield heroin, a drug that
is four to eight times more potent than morphine - and that much more addictive too.
Synthetic opioids that mimic the effect of heroin, like methadone and demerol, were developed in the
1930s. These opioids hijack The receptors in the brain that suppress pain and enhance mood, giving
users the highly addictive feeling of bliss. If too much is consumed in the case of an overdose, the
receptors are flooded and block the brain from completing essential functions like breathing.
That is why opioids are so deadly and have turned into such a major health crisis today. For instance,
black opium, though sometimes injected, is usually smoked. Five or six puffs - a dream world beckons.
Reality is left behind but problems aren't solved. Delicious, decorative, and dangerous...
Poppies are truly the triple threat of the plant world. So what should we talk about next?
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Delicious- oh that's right they're not poppies because poppies have black on the middle
well, that's represented by this... that is the dots. the poppy seeds... and the poppies. yes, it is!
certified! i'm returning this shirt.