How to identify varieties with similar characters but not the same material?

The Essence of Identification of Traditional Chinese Medicine: Character Identification

Health knowledge in Spr

How to identify varieties with similar characters but not the same material?

The Essence of Identification of Traditional Chinese Medicine: Character Identification

Health knowledge in Spring and Autumn Annals of Epidemic Febrile Diseases

Read 30 1 and turn to 32022.02. 13.

Identification of traditional Chinese medicine is the basis of standardization and internationalization of traditional Chinese medicine. Mastering the character identification of traditional Chinese medicine is an essential basic skill for Chinese medicine identification workers. A simple method to identify the appearance characteristics of Chinese herbal medicines through eye, hand, nose, mouth, water and fire tests, and then to identify the authenticity, advantages and disadvantages of Chinese herbal medicines is called character identification method. This method is accumulated by the experience of doctors in past dynasties, and it is also called empirical identification.

Basic content of character recognition

Character identification is the main body of TCM identification, which embodies the valuable experience of predecessors of TCM for thousands of years. Due to the genetic reasons of species, any animal or plant medicine has specific appearance characteristics; The external characteristics of medicinal materials are also related to the internal quality. The appearance of these medicinal materials can help people to judge the authenticity of the medicinal materials.

In the identification of medicinal properties (shape, color, gas and taste), people's senses can be directly used, that is, the methods of seeing, touching, smelling and tasting, and water test and fire test can also be carried out when necessary.

1. shape

Observing the appearance characteristics is an important content of character identification, and many easily confused traditional Chinese medicines can be distinguished by appearance comparison. For example, structure.baiwei and structure.baiwei are easily confused. The former grows horizontally with a hollow cross-section, while the latter grows vertically with tufted roots, which looks like a ponytail and has a solid cross-section. According to this feature, the two can be distinguished. The book "Identification of Hundred Drugs" mainly identifies 100 groups of confusing Chinese medicines through shape comparison.

Related species are merged into genera, and related genera are merged into families. The morphological characteristics of plants belonging to the same genus or family are regular, such as Umbelliferae, whose fruit is blueberry, whose roots are mostly conical and whose rhizomes are linked; Oil spots are often distributed in the cross section. For example, the rhizomes of Zingiberaceae plants are mostly connected, and the roots have longitudinal wrinkles and obvious ring lines.

Different medicinal parts of plants also have different identification rules. For example, traditional Chinese medicine focuses on shape, surface texture, texture and section; Generally, we should observe the shape, size, thickness, surface, texture and section of stem Chinese medicine.

Many empirical terms of personality appraisal are concise and to the point. For example, the identification of wild ginseng is "smooth road, ten thousand meters, jujube pit, tight skin and fine lines, and pearl whiskers", and the main identification points of wild ginseng cultivators are stated in only four words 1 (see figure1). Another example is the identification of high-quality gastrodia elata: "Ying Ge's mouth, the bottom of the dish, the oblate body, the dotted ring and the cutin on the cut surface are a line". Ying Ge's mouth refers to the parrot-like bud left at the top of high-quality winter hemp; Dot ring refers to the pattern of dotted latent bud ring on the surface.

There are some vivid descriptive terms in TCM experience appraisal. For example, "pearl scale" describes the characteristics of gray round scales on the surface of Meretrix meretrix, such as pearl-like convex scales; The "compass pattern" vividly describes the concentric ring pattern of the commercial land.

Step 2 color

The color of medicinal materials is also an important feature of character recognition. For example, the "rose heart" feature of Ephedra sinica refers to the nearly red pith of Ephedra sinica, and the experiment proves that the "rose heart" is a place with high alkaloid content.

According to the different medicinal materials, the color also has its own special requirements. As Ming's Compendium of Materia Medica said: Radix Aucklandiae is "shaped like a dead bone, with blue flesh color, followed by yellow and white, and under black oil"; Coptis chinensis, "choose thick yellow and bright, strong and heavy, and beat the other side with sound to win."

Modern experimental research has also confirmed that the color of medicinal materials is closely related to their quality. For example, the color of Phellodendron amurense is better, because the higher the berberine content, the yellower the medicinal material color; The same is true of Coptis chinensis, especially the yellow-red section, and the content of berberine is also high. In addition, safflower, salvia miltiorrhiza and madder require red, and Arnebia euchroma requires purple, which is related to quality.

Color can not only judge the quality of Chinese herbal medicines, but also be very effective in identifying Chinese herbal pieces. After processing, the color of many Chinese herbal pieces often changes, such as honey turning yellow after baking and deepening after steaming.

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Qi in traditional Chinese medicine is characterized by the feeling after nose smelling, such as fragrance and smell. This is different from the understanding of "qi" in Chinese medicine, which believes that qi is the basic substance that constitutes the human body and maintains human life activities. At the same time, in the theory of traditional Chinese medicine, the four qi of traditional Chinese medicine refers to the four characteristics of cold, hot, warm and cool reflected by the action of drugs.

Each medicinal material has its own unique smell to varying degrees, especially some medicinal materials containing volatile oil, such as Chuanxiong, Angelica sinensis, Magnoliae officinalis, mint and so on. Traditional experience holds that strong fragrance is better, because the intensity of odor reflects the content of volatile oil.

Step 4 taste

For the taste of traditional Chinese medicine, the records in ancient and modern books are quite different. According to the clinical curative effect, we can infer the medicinal taste recorded in TCM classics. Different doctors often have different academic opinions, and the records in different documents are different to varying degrees. General Chinese medicine believes that "Xin San can be feasible, sour can be astringent, sweet can be slowly replenished, bitter can be dry to diarrhea, and salty can be soft to the bottom". The taste mentioned in medicine is the taste you feel after tasting, such as sour, bitter, sweet, spicy, salty and astringent, just like people in different regions have different sensitivities about spicy and not spicy. The taste of most traditional Chinese medicines is consistent with the concept of "taste" in traditional Chinese medicine, but there are some exceptions, for example, Arnebia euchroma is slightly bitter and astringent, while traditional Chinese medicine thinks Arnebia euchroma is sweet and salty.

The taste of traditional Chinese medicine is closely related to the types and contents of its chemical components. For example, Rhizoma Coptidis has bitter taste, which is related to the alkaloid components contained in Rhizoma Coptidis. Generally speaking, the bitter the taste, the higher the alkaloid content. Glycyrrhiza uralensis Fisch is sweet, which is related to its glycyrrhizin. Glycyrrhizin is a sweet component and an effective component of Glycyrrhiza uralensis Fisch, and its own aqueous solution is also sweet. Some traditional Chinese medicines have different tastes because they contain different types of chemical components, such as ginseng, which is sweet and slightly bitter, which is related to the fact that it contains ginseng polysaccharide and ginsenoside at the same time.

5. Hydrostatic test

Chinese herbal medicines will have various special changes after entering the water. Some medicinal materials will rise and fall differently after entering the water because of their different textures. Some medicinal materials change color due to precipitation of internal components, resulting in foam, stickiness and satiny. According to the changes after entering the water, some medicinal materials from different sources can be distinguished. For example, Jing Sanliang is heavy and Bu Sanliang is light, and the two can be distinguished when they enter the water. (See Figure 2)

After safflower, saffron and safflower are soaked in water, the water turns golden yellow and the flowers do not fade; After the crocus is soaked, it first presents a yellow linear band, which hangs directly, and the stigma expands into a long trumpet shape, and the water gradually turns yellow instead of red.

When boat-fruited Sterculia is put into hot water, it expands spongily, which can reach several times its original volume. Seed Chinese medicines, such as Semen Lepidii and Semen Plantaginis, will become sticky and swollen after soaking in water. Some medicinal materials from animals also have some unique changes after testing water, such as the ivory bulge on the section of toad venom after it meets water.

6. Determination of ignition point

Observe the smell, color, smoke, sound, expansion, melting and burning degree of Chinese medicine after burning or baking. Such as frankincense, has a slight aroma after burning and melts slowly; However, frankincense mixed with Liquidambar formosana has a strong aroma and melts quickly.

The character identification of traditional Chinese medicine does not need too much inspection cost, and it is the simplest and most practical, and will not cause environmental pollution. In practical work, especially in grass-roots Chinese medicine shops, pharmacies, drug stores, Chinese medicine markets, etc., it is the most widely used.

The uniqueness of character identification lies in an experienced Chinese pharmacist. He can not only draw reliable conclusions quickly by observing the external characters and judge the authenticity of most medicinal materials, but also make a rough evaluation of the origin, wild or domestic varieties and growth years of some medicinal materials. The identification of Xinyi in Mawangdui Han Tomb before 2000 and the identification of Dalbergia odorifera and Aquilaria sinensis in Quanzhou Song Dynasty ancient shipwreck 900 years ago were completed according to the above-mentioned character identification method combined with microscopic characteristics.

In recent years, the application of some new methods and technologies in character recognition has also enriched its content, provided new recognition means, such as electronic nose and electronic tongue, simulated human olfactory organs and taste system, and helped to avoid the subjectivity of odor judgment in character recognition. These new methods and technologies belong to the extension of character recognition and contribute to the development of this subject.

The Scientific Connotation of Character Recognition

The characteristics of traditional Chinese medicine are not only the appearance characteristics of medicinal materials, but also the external expression of the internal organizational structure and chemical components contained in medicinal materials. Therefore, the essence of exploring the scientific connotation of character identification of traditional Chinese medicine is to interpret the correlation between character characteristics and internal organizational structure and internal chemical composition with modern science.

1. Internal organizational structure

With the development of plant anatomy, microscopic identification technology of traditional Chinese medicine has been widely used, which not only identifies the microscopic identification characteristics of traditional Chinese medicine, but also enriches the theory of character identification of traditional Chinese medicine. On this basis, we can observe the characteristics of medicinal materials, just as we know how to treat cattle.

The cross-sectional characteristics of traditional Chinese medicine are closely related to the internal tissue structure: medicinal materials from the roots of dicotyledonous plants often have cork in the cross-section; A large ring pattern; With radial texture; Small bark, big wood, etc.

The ancients used many figurative terms in the morphological identification of medicinal materials, such as chrysanthemum heart, wheel pattern, rib point, brocade pattern and so on.

2. Contains chemical components

The study of chemical constituents of traditional Chinese medicine has clarified the inner truth of many "flavors". Sour Chinese medicine generally contains organic acids, such as hawthorn and dogwood. The bitterness of traditional Chinese medicine is related to its alkaloids and some saponins, such as Coptidis Rhizoma and Gardenia Fructus. Sweet Chinese medicine often contains a lot of sugar components, such as Codonopsis pilosula and Lycium barbarum. Pungent traditional Chinese medicine often contains volatile oil components, such as dried ginger and asarum. The salty taste of traditional Chinese medicine is related to its rich inorganic salts, such as oysters and isatis salts. The astringency of traditional Chinese medicines is related to their tannins, such as gallnut and terminalia chebula. It can be seen that the "taste" of Chinese medicine is closely related to the internal quality of Chinese medicine.

The smell of traditional Chinese medicine also directly reflects the connection with internal chemical components. Different traditional Chinese medicines contain different chemical components and produce different smells. For example, Houttuynia cordata has a fishy smell, which is related to its houttuynin; The odor of chicken manure from Paederia is related to unsaturated fatty acids in its volatile oil.

Modern research found that the dry bark of Magnolia Officinalis and Magnolia Officinalis increased with the increase of growth years, and the contents of magnolol and honokiol did not reach the highest value until 25 years, indicating that the quality of Magnolia Officinalis is related to the appearance characteristics such as thickness, color and roughness. Among them, the content of magnolol and honokiol in thick-skinned, dark-skinned and rough-skinned Magnolia officinalis is high, and the quality of the medicinal materials is good, which is consistent with the main basis of traditional folk evaluation of the quality of Magnolia officinalis.

In addition to the direct analysis of the relationship between shape characteristics and chemical composition, the analysis and research on the internal tissue characteristics and chemical composition of plants also show that the shape characteristics of medicinal materials have certain correlation with chemical composition. For example, by observing and analyzing the tissue changes, the fluctuation of starch granules and the accumulation of ginsenoside during the development of American ginseng taproot, it is found that with the increase of ginseng age, the proportion of phloem and xylem decreases from large to small, the occurrence of secretory canals gradually stops, the content of starch granules gradually decreases, and the content of ginsenoside gradually increases, thus organically linking microscopic characteristics, morphological characteristics and chemical components, which is helpful to preliminarily evaluate the quality of traditional Chinese medicine through morphological characteristics.

These modern research results are helpful to interpret the scientific connotation of TCM syndrome differentiation and classification.

New topics, new challenges

Although the identification method of traditional Chinese medicine has gone through thousands of years and solved many first-line problems of quality control, with the development of society and the change of environment, the corresponding character identification index description has not been established. The character identification of traditional Chinese medicine is facing many new topics, which should be constantly enriched and innovated to keep pace with the times.

1. Cultivated and wild

The source of ancient Chinese medicine mainly depends on the wild. In recent years, the cultivation of medicinal materials has developed rapidly. Soil, climate, temperature and fertilizer not only affect the secondary metabolites contained in cultivated medicinal materials, but also cause changes in the characteristics of medicinal materials. Therefore, the laws of character recognition need to be discovered and summarized in time.

For example, salvia miltiorrhiza, wild cork is rough and easy to peel off; The cultivator has thick roots, dense epidermis and few fibrous roots. Another example is windproof, which is divided into domestic windproof and wild windproof. Saposhnikovia divaricata is the general name of cultivated products in various places, and its quality and appearance characteristics are different due to soil quality, water and fertilizer management and other reasons. Compared with wild Saposhnikovia divaricata, domestic Saposhnikovia divaricata is usually stout, the earthworm head is not obvious or obvious, the weight is slightly heavy, the powder is slightly thick, the chrysanthemum is light in heart color, the epithelial crack on the cross section is underdeveloped, the breath is slightly weak, and the taste is sweet and not pungent.

In recent years, the application of chemical fertilizer in the planting process has led to the rapid growth of plants. For example, the cultivated Pinellia ternata not only grows very big, but also produces small tubers in some parts. Modern research results show that cultivated varieties are not necessarily inferior to wild varieties.

2. Related varieties and hybrids

Due to the decrease of medicinal plant resources, many related plants have also been developed for medicinal purposes. At the same time, with the development of biotechnology and cultivation techniques, some hybrid varieties of medicinal plants have also entered the Chinese medicine market.

For example, there are different hybrid varieties in Nanyang, Henan Province, among which the better varieties are "magnolia armpit", "magnolia peach" and "magnolia monkey palm".

For these medicinal materials from related varieties and hybrids, their characteristics are often very similar, which needs to be combined with plant taxonomy and traced back to the source in order to correctly identify the varieties of traditional Chinese medicine.

In addition, there are some related varieties or hybrids with obvious differences in medicinal properties. For example, Gardenia jasminoides Ellis, a Chinese medicine recorded in China Pharmacopoeia (2005 edition), comes from the dried and mature fruit of Gardenia jasminoides Ellis. In the actual Chinese medicine commodity market, gardenia and gardenia fruit are also used for medicine. It is generally believed that gardenia is used as a dye and gardenia is a medicinal variety. In terms of characters, gardenia is round and small, and gardenia is rectangular, almost twice as long as gardenia.

Because botany and medicinal herbs have different views on medicinal varieties, the identification indexes of some practical medicinal varieties have not been described and need to be systematically sorted out.

3. Traditional Chinese medicine decoction pieces

Chinese herbal pieces are a major feature of clinical medication in traditional Chinese medicine. With the continuous application of new processing methods and techniques and the continuous improvement of traditional processing techniques, the character identification of Chinese herbal pieces has also put forward a new topic. For example, the use of processing machinery, the updating of processing methods, and the differences between North and South processing methods in China have also brought more or less changes to the internal and external appearance of Chinese herbal pieces. It is also urgent to explore, summarize and establish the character identification characteristics of Chinese herbal pieces.

As a special commodity, Chinese medicine has been counterfeited since ancient times. The operation of modern commodity society and market economy has also had a certain impact on the characteristics of traditional Chinese medicine. For the purpose of profit, some medicinal materials will have new characteristics after "makeup". For example, lily, Fritillaria, yam, chrysanthemum, bitter orange and angelica are fumigated and dried with sulfur, and the decoction pieces often change color after being fumigated with sulfur. The establishment of technical standards for these Chinese herbal pieces needs to cooperate with market management.

4. Date of harvest, place of origin and storage time

Medicinal materials collected at different times will have different characteristics. For example, forsythia suspensa, harvested in the early stage of Qingqiao, is green-brown, with no crack at the top, with seeds inside after cutting, and harvested in the late stage of Laoqiao, which is yellow-brown or reddish-brown, and has split into two petals, and most of the seeds have fallen off. Another example is gastrodia elata, which is divided into winter hemp and spring hemp. After the solstice of winter, it is "Winter Hemp", which has a solid weight and a reddish-brown Ying Ge-shaped terminal bud, and "Spring Hemp" is the front digger of long summer. Compared with winter hemp, it is loose and light, with residual stems at the top.

The appearance of medicinal materials from different producing areas will also change. Such as Lycium barbarum, Ningxia Lycium barbarum is rectangular, sweet, rosy, light in water, light in grain and easy to float; Xinjiang Lycium barbarum is round, extremely sweet, red when fresh, soft and heavy after dark, red after soaking in water and easy to sink.

The color or smell of medicinal materials with different storage time also changes to some extent. Such as Schisandra chinensis and Lycium barbarum, it is easy to turn black if stored improperly or for a long time; The new product of Cornus officinalis is purple and sour; Old goods are brown, weak in gas and bitter in taste; The aged tangerine peel is the most expensive, and the fresh tangerine peel is orange-red or reddish-brown, and it is fragrant; After a long time, the color becomes darker and the smell is rich.

It is necessary to observe, summarize and describe the possible character differences of these medicinal materials from different collection periods, producing areas and storage times, and to explore the relationship between these character differences and the quality of medicinal materials, so as to provide guidance for "differentiating symptoms and discussing quality".

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It has been five years since Professor Xie Zongwan left us. He has accumulated 60 years of valuable experience in herbal medicine and medicinal material identification, and put forward the view that the essence of traditional experience identification of Chinese medicine varieties lies in "differentiating symptoms and discussing quality". Look at the China Pharmacopoeia, Japanese Pharmacy Prescriptions, Indian Pharmacopoeia, Hong Kong Chinese Herbal Medicine Standards and other standards, all of which list the description of characters as the first item. It can be said that character identification is always the cornerstone of Chinese herbal medicine identification.

The classification, identification and quality evaluation of medicinal materials have been unsolved for thousands of years. Considering the identification of traditional Chinese medicine from this perspective is also a frontier academic topic to ensure the safety of drug use. Just like "syndrome differentiation and treatment" in clinical diagnosis of TCM, "syndrome differentiation and treatment" is the basis of TCM identification and the essence of TCM experience identification, which should be carefully sorted out, inherited and carried forward.

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