Development of quality evaluation method of licorice by metabolomics

中药质量评价与控制是中药研究的重点和难点。甘草是日本最重要的药用植物之一，《日本药典》对甘草碱的含量进行了规定。然而，甘草提取物的生物活性，如抑制一氧化氮在巨相细胞的产生，不能仅仅通过甘草中甘草碱的含量来估计。而代谢组学数据具有全面的组分数据，可以准确地估计这些组分。结果表明，中药提取物的代谢组学数据对中药质量评价具有重要意义。

Quality evaluation and control of herbal medicines are important but difficult issues. Licorice is the one of the most important herb in Japan, and regulated by glycyrrhizine content according to Pharmacopeia of Japan. However, biological activities of licorice extracts, such as suppression of nitric oxide generation in macrophase cell, could not be estimated by just only glycyrrhizine content of licorice. However, those could be estimated by metabolome data which possesses comprehensive component data accurately. We suggested that metabolome data in harbal extract is quite useful for quality evaluation of herbal medicines.