Pitfalls of the selection of chemical markers for the quality control of medicinal herbs

Sunny Sun Kin Chan, Song Lin Li, Ge Lin

Research output: Contribution to journalReview articlepeer-review

13 Scopus citations

Abstract

Selection of chemical marker is critical to the quality control and standardization of medicinal herbs. The ideal chemical marker is the active principle with demonstrated clinical efficacy contributing to the therapeutic effect of the herb, while the worst ones are the analytical marker and "phantom" marker whose pharmacological actions are unknown, uncontrollable or unpredictable. In this article, we explore the seven categories of chemical markers, discuss the pitfalls of choosing them, and illustrate the problems using a traditional Chinese medicinal herb Ligusticum chuanxiong as an example.

Original languageEnglish (US)
Pages (from-to)365-371
Number of pages7
JournalJournal of Food and Drug Analysis
Volume15
Issue number4
StatePublished - Dec 1 2007

Keywords

  • Chemical marker
  • Ligusticum chuanxiong
  • Medicinal herb
  • Quality control

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