Planta Med 2011; 77 - P_63
DOI: 10.1055/s-0031-1273592

NMR-Based Metabolomics for Authentication and Differentiation of Medicinal Plants

J Zhao 1, B Avula 1, IA Khan 1, 2, 3
  • 1National Center for Natural Products Research, School of Pharmacy, University of Mississippi, University, MS 38677, USA
  • 2Department of Pharmacognosy, School of Pharmacy, University of Mississippi, University, MS 38677, USA
  • 3Department of Pharmacognosy, College of Pharmacy, King Saud University, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia

The first step in quality control of botanical products is ensuring the correct identification of the plant material intended for use [1,2]. There are several methods for identification, including macroscopic/microscopic methods, chromatographic methods (TLC, GC and LC), spectroscopic methods (IR, FT-IR, UV, AA, ICP, MS and NMR), and genomic method (DNA) [3]. Nuclear Magnetic Resonance (NMR) analysis of botanical products can provide rich qualitative and quantitative information on their components. The ability of NMR to analyze complex mixtures as a non-targeted fingerprinting tool makes it an attractive analytic tool for authentication and differentiation of medicinal plant extracts. To explore the potential of an NMR-based approach applied for identification and discrimination of medicinal plants, the plant extracts from species of the genus Caralluma and Terminalia, as well as their products were examined. The methodologies regarding sample preparation, NMR data generation, data processing, chemometric modeling, spectral pattern recognition, and database establishing were investigated. The results showed that an NMR-based metabolomic approach can be a powerful tool for authentication and differentiation of medicinal plants.

Acknowledgements: This work was supported in part by „Science Based Authentication of Dietary Supplements“ and „Botanical Dietary Supplement Research“ funded by the Food and Drug Administration grant numbers 5U01FD002071–10 and 1U01FD003871–02, and the United States Department of Agriculture, Agricultural Research Service, Specific Cooperative Agreement No. 58–6408–2-0009.

References: [1] FDA Guidance for Industry: Botanical Drug Products (June 2004). [2] Khan IA (2006) Life Sci, 78(18): 2033–8. [3] Techen N, Crockett SL, et al. (2004) Curr Med Chem, 11(11): 1391–401.