Identification of medicinal plants within the Apocynaceae family using ITS2 and psbA-trnH barcodes.

To ensure the safety of medications, it is vital to accurately authenticate species of the Apocynaceae family, which is rich in poisonous medicinal plants. We identified Apocynaceae species by using nuclear internal transcribed spacer 2 (ITS2) and psbA-trnH based on experimental data. The identification ability of ITS2 and psbA-trnH was assessed using specific genetic divergence, BLAST1, and neighbor-joining trees. For DNA barcoding, ITS2 and psbA-trnH regions of 122 plant samples of 31 species from 19 genera in the Apocynaceae family were amplified. The PCR amplification for ITS2 and psbA-trnH sequences was 100%. The sequencing success rates for ITS2 and psbA-trnH sequences were 81% and 61%, respectively. Additional data involved 53 sequences of the ITS2 region and 38 sequences of the psbA-trnH region were downloaded from GenBank. Moreover, the analysis showed that the inter-specific divergence of Apocynaceae species was greater than its intra-specific variations. The results indicated that, using the BLAST1 method, ITS2 showed a high identification efficiency of 97% and 100% of the samples at the species and genus levels, respectively, via BLAST1, and psbA-trnH successfully identified 95% and 100% of the samples at the species and genus levels, respectively. The barcode combination of ITS2/psbA-trnH successfully identified 98% and 100% of samples at the species and genus levels, respectively. Subsequently, the neighbor joining tree method also showed that barcode ITS2 and psbA-trnH could distinguish among the species within the Apocynaceae family. ITS2 is a core barcode and psbA-trnH is a supplementary barcode for identifying species in the Apocynaceae family. These results will help to improve DNA barcoding reference databases for herbal drugs and other herbal raw materials.

[Quality of commercial Amomum villosum].

In recent years, with the price rise of Amomum villosum, the quality of A. villosum in the market has been in disorder. To understand the quality status of A. villosum in the market and provide reference for the commercial size fifty-seven samples were collected from different producing areas or markets from August 2013. The samples were detected with evaluation on appearance quality, determination of the contents of bornyl acetate, determination of pesticide residues and heavy metals residues based on Chinese Pharmacopoeia 2015. The results showed that the pesticide residues and heavy metals residues met the requirments, all the samples from different producing areas were qualified except one sample from Fujian province. The qualified rate of native products and imports products samples from market were 43.75% and 14.29%, respectively, the qualified rate of the samples of Yunnan province from producing areas was higher than that from the market. There are two ports at the national level in Yunnan province, where the southern herbs from. A. villosumis one of import medicines from Southeast Asia, and lots of A. villosum samples import to China from Yunnan ports. Most of pharmacists believed that all of the samples from Yunnan province produced in Yunnan. The great majority of commercial species was A. villosum, but A. longiliglare was scarce. Through the survey, it isfound that the main factors affecting the quality of Amomi Fructus was source, lots of A. villosum samples have been replaced by the Amomi Fructus, so the source of imports Amomi Fructus was not clear, which was also more difficult to identify. The quality of A. villosum needs to protect, optimize germplasm, strict control of medicinal sources, specification for medicinal harvesting and processing technology.

[Optimization of extraction of Clerodendranthus spicatus using response surface methodology].

OBJECTIVE: To obtain the optimal conditions of extraction of Clerodendranthus spicatus and provide the theoretical foundation for its further processing and utilization. METHODS: On the basis of the single factor test, response surface methodology was applied to optimize the extraction conditions. RESULTS: The results showed that extraction time, water-feed ratio, ethanol concentration and extraction temperature all had significant effects on the extraction rate of polysaccharides. The optimal extraction time was 3h, solid-liquid ratio was 50:1, ethanol concentration was 30% and extraction temperature was 80 degrees C. Under these optimized conditions, the extraction rate was 27.71%. CONCLUSION: The extraction technology is simple, reliable and highly predictive.

[Study on treatment of early onset of severe pre-eclampsia by salviae injection and ligustrazine injection in combining with Western medicine].

OBJECTIVE: To evaluate the efficacy of Salviae injection and ligustrazine injection (S & L) in combining with Western medicine for treatment of early onset of severe pre-eclampsia (EOSP), and its impact on pregnancy. METHODS: An open prospective controlled study was conducted on 63 women suffering from EOSP during the 29th-32th week of pregnancy. They were assigned, according to the sequence of hospitalizing, to the treated group (32 cases) and the control group (31 cases). Both groups were treated with conventional Western medical treatment, but S & L were administered additionally to the treated group. Levels of plasma D-dimer, blood viscosity, and outcome of the pregnancy were analyzed. RESULTS: The effect in prolonging the pregnancy and lowing the incidence of fetal distress and newborn death in the treated group was superior to that in the control group, the corresponding data were 11.0 +/- 1.2 days, 11 cases, 4 cases in the treated group and 6.0 +/- 1.5 days, 16 cases and 8 cases in the control group, respectively. Levels of blood viscosity ratio and D-dimer in the treated group were lowered significantly after treatment (1.20 +/- 0.13 vs 2.29 +/- 0.13, 1.61 +/- 0.45 mg/L vs 2.40 +/- 0.09 mg/L), which had no remarkable change in the control group. CONCLUSION: Combined application of S & L for treatment of EOSP could improve the blood hyperviscosity, prolong the pregnancy week, and improve the outcome of pregnancy to reduce incidence of perinatal morbidity and mortality in patients.