Advances in consideration and application of identification methods for powdered Chinese materia medica / 中草药

ABSTRACT

Powdered Chinese materia medica (CMM) is widely applied in the field of medicine. Because their qualities directly influence the safety and efficiency of clinical medication, it is very important to conduct the identification of powdered CMM in order to supply an excellent quality for clinical medication. In this paper, a review on the current identification methods was carried on through reading many relative papers. Subsequently we further searched for their evolvement trend, then the new viewpoints that the key of the development of identification technologies lies in using proper technologies and methods to dig CMM characteristics and to expand its application were proposed based on concluding these methods. The embodiment of description comes true as the development of Bionic Technology. Therefore, in this work, we proposed a new thread that on the basis of "odor and taste", with the help of electronic nose and electronic tongue technologies, a successful identification of powdered CMM has been accomplished. Additionally, the authors express their views about the identification methods by adopting Fritillaria Unibracteata Bulbus and Fritillariae Thunbergii Bulbus powders as experimental materials.