[2] It has several potential uses: (i) forage crop, (ii) Phytostabilization of heavy metal contaminated or degraded soils, (iii) Synthesis of furanocoumarins (psoralen, angelicin, xanthotoxin and bergapten), compounds of broad pharmaceutical interest.

This strong tar-like characteristic aroma appears to be the result of a combination of several substances such as phenolics, sulphurated compounds, sesquiterpenes and probably short-chain hydrocarbon.

The Arabian pea was first legitimately described in 1753 by Carl Linnaeus in his Species Plantarum, the work which is now internationally accepted as the starting point of modern botanical nomenclature, and he called it Psoralea bituminosa.

Philipp Conrad Fabricius described the genus Bituminaria in 1759, that was suggested by Lorenz Heister earlier, but without a proper description.

Jules Pierre Fourreau considered that Linnaeus was the earliest and he made the new combination Asphalthium bituminosum in 1868.