Among some of western Tanzania's WaTongwe people, roots from the mulengelele plant are the treatment of choice for worms and other intestinal problems. The therapy was inspired by a sick porcupine that a traditional healer named Babu Kalunde followed a half century ago to find out what the animal, which recovered, was eating.

In the U.S. Southwest, Navajo Indians use roots of Ligisticum porteri, a member of the parsnip family, as a topical antiseptic. They say their ancestors learned about this treatment from a bear.

Throughout history and in cultures around the world, legends handed down for generations tell similar tales of animals treating and curing themselves of disease. Biologists, too, have long observed animals eating plants with no known nutritional value and wondered whether the creatures were ingesting them as medicine. Now a handful of studies provide compelling evidence that the answer is yes.

An eclectic band of biochemists, zoologists and other specialists who conduct such research have even created a field of study that they call zoopharmacognosy. These scientists say that the great apes alone consume at least 50 plant species that likely are effective against disorders from stomachaches, to skin parasites, to infertility. Such selfmedication also has been reported in dozens of other species.

Zoopharmacognocist Michael Huffman of Japan's Kyoto University predicts that scientists eventually will document selfmedication throughout the animal kingdom. New examples keep turning up and Huffman thinks that animal physicians may have important lessons to teach the human species.

As far back as the 1970s, Harvard University anthropologist Richard Wrangham suspected Tanzanian chimpanzees might be medicating themselves. Every so often, the animals went to great lengths to locate plants within the genus Aspilia, even when more palatable and nutritious foods were abundant. Once they found the plant, the chimps pulled off leaves one at a time, folded them, rolled them slowly in their mouths and then finally swallowed the leaves whole. Inspecting the chimps' dung, Wrangham discovered that the leaves were passing through the animals undigested, providing no nourishment at all.

More recent studies conducted independently by Huffman and Wrangham have found that leafswallowing chimps tend to be infected with parasites. More important, the chimps expelled the parasites after they ate some of the leaves.

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