title: Cultivation and breeding of Chinese medicinal plants in Germany.
abstract: Chinese herbal medicine (CHM) is increasingly used in Germany and Europe. Due to the need for herbal drugs of consistent quality and reliable supply, methods for commercial field cultivation and post-harvest processing under south German conditions have been developed for selected plant species used in CHM since 1999. The project used an interdisciplinary approach covering all aspects from seed sourcing to medicinal application. This paper describes the outcome of the agricultural seed and field experiments, breeding program, botanical and chemical characterization of the experimental material, comparison of experimental and imported herbal material with respect to their pharmaceutical quality, transfer of production methods and plant material to specialized farmers, medicinal application and, finally, information for users along the chain of distribution about the benefits of the locally produced herbal material.
authors.affiliation: Bavarian State Research Center for Agriculture (LfL), Institute for Crop Science and Plant Breeding, Medicinal and Aromatic Plants, Vöttinger Strasse 38, Freising, Germany. Heidi.Heuberger@LfL.bayern.de
authors.forename: Heidi
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Heuberger
authors.forename: Rudolf
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Bauer
authors.forename: Fritz
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Friedl
authors.forename: Günther
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Heubl
authors.forename: Josef
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Hummelsberger
authors.forename: Rainer
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Nögel
authors.forename: Rebecca
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Seidenberger
authors.forename: Paula
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Torres-Londoño
mesh_terms: D000383:Agriculture; D001947:Breeding; D018744:DNA, Plant / Q000032:analysis; D004365:Drugs, Chinese Herbal / Q000737:chemistry; D005060:Europe; D005858:Germany; D010946:Plants, Medicinal / Q000737:chemistry* / Q000235:genetics*; D012639:Seeds / Q000145:classification; D017422:Sequence Analysis, DNA
chemical_list: D018744:DNA, Plant; D004365:Drugs, Chinese Herbal