Herbal medicines are important options for the treatment of several illnesses. Although their therapeutic applicability has been demonstrated throughout history, several concerns about their safety and efficacy are raised regularly. Quality control of articles of botanical origin, including plant materials, plant extracts, and herbal medicines, remains a challenge. Traditionally, qualitative (e.g., identification and chromatographic profile) and quantitative (e.g., content analyses) markers are applied for this purpose. The compound-oriented approach may stand alone in some cases (e.g., atropine in Atropa belladonna). However, for most plant materials, plant extracts, and herbal medicines, it is not possible to assure quality based only on the content or presence/absence of one (sometimes randomly selected) compound. In this sense, pattern-oriented approaches have been extensively studied, introducing the use of multivariate data analysis on chromatographic/spectroscopic fingerprints. The use of genetic methods for plant material/plant extract authentication has also been proposed. In this study, traditional approaches are reviewed, although the focus is on the applicability of fingerprints for quality control, highlighting the most used approaches, as well as demonstrating their usefulness. The literature review shows that a pattern-oriented approach may be successfully applied to the quality assessment of articles of botanical origin, while also providing directions for a compound-oriented approach and a rational marker selection. These observations indicate that it may be worth considering to include fingerprints and their data analysis in the regulatory framework for herbal medicines concerning quality control since this is the foundation of the holistic view that these complex products demand.

中文翻译：

---

草药的质量控制：从传统技术到最先进的方法

草药是治疗多种疾病的重要选择。尽管它们的治疗适用性已经在整个历史中得到证明，但对其安全性和有效性的一些担忧经常被提出。植物来源物品的质量控制，包括植物材料、植物提取物和草药，仍然是一个挑战。传统上，为此目的应用定性（例如，鉴定和色谱图）和定量（例如，含量分析）标记。在某些情况下，面向化合物的方法可能是独立的（例如，颠茄中的阿托品）。然而，对于大多数植物材料、植物提取物和草药，仅根据一种（有时是随机选择的）化合物的含量或存在/不存在来保证质量是不可能的。在这个意义上，已经广泛研究了面向模式的方法，引入了对色谱/光谱指纹的多变量数据分析的使用。还建议使用遗传方法进行植物材料/植物提取物认证。本研究回顾了传统方法，但重点是指纹在质量控制中的适用性，突出了最常用的方法，并展示了它们的实用性。文献综述表明，面向模式的方法可以成功地应用于植物来源物品的质量评估，同时也为面向化合物的方法和合理的标记选择提供了方向。