title: Traditional Medicine Collection Tracking System (TM-CTS): a database for ethnobotanically driven drug-discovery programs.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Ethnobotanically driven drug-discovery programs include data related to many aspects of the preparation of botanical medicines, from initial plant collection to chemical extraction and fractionation. The Traditional Medicine Collection Tracking System (TM-CTS) was created to organize and store data of this type for an international collaborative project involving the systematic evaluation of commonly used Traditional Chinese Medicinal plants.
  
  
  METHODS
  The system was developed using domain-driven design techniques, and is implemented using Java, Hibernate, PostgreSQL, Business Intelligence and Reporting Tools (BIRT), and Apache Tomcat.
  
  
  RESULTS
  The TM-CTS relational database schema contains over 70 data types, comprising over 500 data fields. The system incorporates a number of unique features that are useful in the context of ethnobotanical projects such as support for information about botanical collection, method of processing, quality tests for plants with existing pharmacopoeia standards, chemical extraction and fractionation, and historical uses of the plants. The database also accommodates data provided in multiple languages and integration with a database system built to support high throughput screening based drug discovery efforts. It is accessed via a web-based application that provides extensive, multi-format reporting capabilities.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  This new database system was designed to support a project evaluating the bioactivity of Chinese medicinal plants. The software used to create the database is open source, freely available, and could potentially be applied to other ethnobotanically driven natural product collection and drug-discovery programs.
authors.affiliation: Department of Biological Chemistry and Molecular Pharmacology, Harvard Medical School, 240 Longwood Ave., Boston, MA 02115, USA. eharris@fas.harvard.edu
authors.forename: Eric S J
authors.initials: ES
authors.lastname: Harris
authors.forename: Sean D
authors.initials: SD
authors.lastname: Erickson
authors.forename: Andrew N
authors.initials: AN
authors.lastname: Tolopko
authors.forename: Shugeng
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Cao
authors.forename: Jane A
authors.initials: JA
authors.lastname: Craycroft
authors.forename: Robert
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Scholten
authors.forename: Yanling
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Fu
authors.forename: Wenquan
authors.initials: W
authors.lastname: Wang
authors.forename: Yong
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Liu
authors.forename: Zhongzhen
authors.initials: Z
authors.lastname: Zhao
authors.forename: Jon
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Clardy
authors.forename: Caroline E
authors.initials: CE
authors.lastname: Shamu
authors.forename: David M
authors.initials: DM
authors.lastname: Eisenberg
mesh_terms: D003628:Database Management Systems; D055808:Drug Discovery; D008519:Medicine, Traditional