A dioecious, perennial vine arising from a tuberous root. Stem robust, angular, tendrils simple. Leaf blade suborbicular in outline, 12-20 cm in diameter, deeply palmately 3(-5)-lobed, cordate and with some glands at base, lobes subovate with entire or subdentate margins, glabrous, petiole with 2-5 glands near the middle. Flowers solitary, about 8 cm in diameter, yellow, but blackish at base inside; male flowers on a peduncle 5-30 cm long bearing an apical, suborbicular, sessile bract, 3-4 cm x 4-5 cm, pedicel 3-10 mm long; female flowers similar but with a smaller bract. Fruit 10-20 cm x 6-10 cm, yellow, turning red at maturity, densely covered with small tubercles. Seeds about 25 mm x 20 mm x 5 mm, brown, testa sculptured.

Coolant, resolvent and laxative (seeds); expectorant (roots)

PROSEA (Plant Resources of South-East Asia) Foundation

Used to treat chest complaints, abdominal pains, dysentery, mesenteric enlargements, obstructions of liver and spleen and haemorrhoids (seeds); applied externally to wounds, bruises, burns, skin trouble, ulcers, breast cancer, abscesses, mumps and lumbago (seeds soaked in water or alcohol); may be used as a soap and to kill head lice (roots); in the treatment of oedema of the legs, a kind of rheumatism (roots and leaves).