Medicinal Plants Classification Biosynthesis and ... - Index of

280
Jia Guan and Shao-Ping Li
Keywords: Polysaccharides; Quality control; Medicinal plants; Medicinal fungi;
Qualification; Quantitation
1. Introduction
Medicinal plants originate from almost every part of the globe. Such plants serve the
primary healthcare needs of up to 80 percent of people in Africa, and account for 30%-50%
of the total medicinal consumption in China [1]. WHO has identified 20,000 species of
medicinal plants for screening [2]. On the other hand, there are at least 270 species of
mushroom (fungus) that are known to have various therapeutic properties [3]. Furthermore, it
is reported that there are about 650 species from 182 genera of higher Hetero- and Homobasidiomycetes
(fungi) have been shown to contain biologically active antitumour and
immunostimulative polysaccharides [4].
Polysaccharides, a class of carbohydrates consisting of a number of (usually more than
10) monosaccharides joined by glycosidic bonds in branched or unbranched chains, are
usually considered as one of the active compounds in medicinal plants and fungi. In last
decade, the polysaccharides have attracted a great deal of attention in the biomedical arena
because of their broad spectrum of therapeutic properties and relatively low toxicity (Figure
1). It was reported that there are more than 300 kinds of polysaccharides extracted from the
natural plants [5], in which the water-soluble polysaccharides from traditional Chinese herbs
are most important for their significant pharmacological activities, such as anti-cancer, antiinflammation,
immune potentiation and blood sugar reduction (Table 1). However, the
activities of polysaccharides are strongly related to their monosaccharides composition,
molecular mass, configuration and position of glycosidic linkages, etc. Therefore, quality
control of polysaccharides is necessary for ensuring their efficacy and safety. In this review,
qualitative and quantitative analysis, including the tests of purity, molecular mass and its
distribution, monosaccharides composition and their ratio, configuration and position of
glycosidic linkages, and quantitative determination of polysaccharides were reviewed and
discussed.
Articles
1800
1400
1000
600
200
1277
1323
1375 1348
1425 1432
1557
1636
1717
1763
1997 1998 1999 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 years
Figure 1. Growth in the number of journal articles on polysaccharides appearing annually during the
last decade based on the data from ISI Web of Science.