Sino-US TCM Research Center

Current Challenges:

Millions of people throughout the world are utilizing Traditional Chinese Medicines (TCM) for medicinal purposes. However, there still exists a need to standardize and validate the TCM preparations on the market to enhance their safety and reproducibility. Currently, there is still a significant lack of scientific understanding of the compounds within many plants that are responsible for the desired biological effects and as a result, many TCM’s are not standardized or are standardized to a marker that has no meaningful biological effect. There is also a lack of availability of purified reference standards from authenticated plant samples, validated analytical methods for authentication purposes and highly purified reference standards. A concentrated collaborative effort by leading natural products institutions is needed to address these issues related to TCM. An often-overlooked part of the standardization process is the need to properly voucher and identify the plant species from which the extract and ultimately the compound are taken. This process referred to as good botanical practices is the only way results can conform to the scientific requirement of reproducibility. Part of the proposed Sino-US TCM Research Center will be to ensure that all chemistry is built on a foundation of such reproducibility, in order to avoid some of the mistakes of the past.

Mission:

To collaboratively study and promote the value, safety and utilization of Traditional Chinese Medicines (TCM) through the development of a joint Sino-US TCM research center. Both the Shanghai Institute of Materia Medica/CAS, China and the National Center for Natural Product Research will undertake the development of said center in order to meet the following objectives.

Objectives:

Isolate and purify potential bio-active chemicals from TCM’s to serve both as analytical reference standards and for biological evaluation

• Develop and validate analytical methods for TCM’s
• Identify and qualify new analytical techniques
• Exchange visiting scientists for the promotion of TCM research
• Host workshops on standardization, safety and other quality control issues
• Maintain a repository of plant voucher specimens, extracts and reference standards