Analysis of varieties and characteristics of marine Chinese medicines recorded in Compendium of Materia Medica / 中草药

ABSTRACT

In this paper, the methods of literature study and data analysis were used to search and collect the information of the varieties of marine traditional Chinese medicine (MTCM) recorded in Compendium of Materia Medica (CMM), in order to analyze the changes of the varieties made by the comparison of CMM and the other ancient herbal works, as well as the added varieties and their habitat distribution, property and flavor, efficacy based on the species collected in Chinese Marine Materia Medica. At the same time, the classification, five-taste, four-nature, and efficacy of MTCM recorded in CMM were deeply analyzed. The results showed that 190 species of MTCM were recorded in CMM, 12 species of which were added compared with the classic works before Ming Dynasty. The main flavors of MTCM recorded in CMM were sweet taste (29.47%) and salty taste (16.84%), the main property of them was mild (30.53%), followed by cold nature (23.16%) and warm nature (10.00%). For the efficacy, the most of them were tonic (22.11%) and clearing heat (20.53%), followed by dissolving phlegm, relieving cough and relieving asthma (8.95%), and promoting diuresis and expelling pathogenic dampness (6.32%). The varieties and characteristics of the marine traditional Chinese medicines recorded in CMM were systematically sorted out and analyzed for the first time in this paper.