【Introduction】

   Microscopic identification is a method using a microscope to identify the characteristics of tissue, cells and ergastic substances in Chinese Crude Drugs (CCDs) samples and their preparations, so as to determine the authenticity of CMM. As one of the most important methods for CCDs identification, the microscopic of US, Europe and Japan for some botanical medicines. The Pharmacopoeia of the People’s Republic of China started to record the microscopic identification under the identification items ever since the 1977 edition. With more research done in this field, more and more CCDs species were added with the microscopic identification items in the following editions, up to 225 out of 551 CCDs and 97 out of 566 Chinese patent medicines included in the 2005 edition, comprising 61% and 17% of all species, respectively.

The book includes two parts - General Introduction and Individual Descriptions, the Latter of which documented all the species of Chinese Crude Drugs (CCDs)with the microscopic identification items in “the Pharmacopoeia of People’s Republic of China” (2005 edition)(hereinafter abbr. ChP). Among them, there 115 species with tissue characteristics, 169 with powder characteristics and 51 with both characteristics of tissue and powder.

For each document CCDs, the record items include: the species name(Chinese name. Chinese phonetic name and Latin name), source(including family name, plant or animal name, Latin scientific name and used part), microscopic characteristics(including descriptions, colored pictures and figure legends both in Chinese and English).

【Main Contents】

General Introduction
Chapter One Brief development history of microscopic identification
Chapter Two Principles of Microscopic Identification of CMM
Chapter Three Methods of CMM microscopic identification
Latin Name Index of CMM
Arillus Longan
Arisaema Cum Bile
Bombyx Batryticatus
Bulbus Fritillariae Cirrhosae
Bulbus Fritillariae Hupehensis
……
Appendix(Contents and Explanations about the revised species)
Chinese Phonetic Name Index of CMM
Latin Name Index of the Source of CMM
Latin Name Index of CMM(listed in the contents)