Illustrated Handbook for Medicinal Materials from Nature in Yunnan, Volume 1 [Chinese]

About this book

Language: Chinese with scientific nomenclature

The province of Yunnan, China, is well known for its largest number of natural medicinal material resources and is famous for its special natural conditions, earning it the reputation of “Kingdom of Plants” and “Hometown of Medicinal Materials”.

Yunnan is located in the southwest frontier region of China. It is situated at 21°8' – 29°15′N and 97°31′ – 106°11′E. It is about 861.9 km across from the east to the south, and about 900 km from the south to the north with an area of 383 000km².

The investigation of the resources of traditional Chinese medicine in Yunnan between 1984 and 1988 has shown that there are 6 559 kinds of medicinal materials, about 51 percent of all kinds of plants in China, belonging to 315 families, 1 814 genera and 6 157 species of plants; 148 families, 266 genera, and 372 species of animals; and 30 kinds of minerals.

With more and more recognition on the application of natural materials and accelerating modernization of traditional Chinese medicine and Western development, we hope to take pictures for 6 000 medicinal materials growing in Yunnan and gradually publish the other volumes of the Illustrated Handbook for Medicinal Materials in Yunnan, and provide reference books and CDs which are well organized and illustrated with perfect pictures for researchers and amateurs to recognize as much as possible the medicinal resources of Yunnan.

The first volume of the book contains 508 species of natural medicinal materials, with each species receiving a colour photo and about 600 words, with notes on morphology, distribution, medicinal parts, herborization, processing, characteristics, taste and function, modern research, and a scientific and Chinese Pinyin name index. The systematic arrangements for pteridophytes follows Renchang Qin’s system, and that for gymnosperms and angiosperms follow Wanjun Zheng's system and Hutchinson’s system respectively. The book is well organized and is a nice reference showing the state of resources of Yunnan.

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