Analysis of active patents to investigate the frequency and patterns of Chinese herbal extract combinations claiming to treat heart disease

Objective:Using Chinese patents in force to investigate the frequency and patterns of Chinese herbal extract combinations claiming to treat heart disease.Methods:Patent documents were retrieved from the official website of the State Intellectual Property Office of the People’s Republic China.Cluster,frequency,and fuzzy cluster analyses were applied.Results:A high number of patents in force included high-frequency herbs such as Salvia miltiorrhiza,Panax ginseng,and Panax notoginseng,as well as high-frequency herbal families such as Araliaceae,Leguminosae,Labiatae,and Umbelliferae.Herb pairs such as P.ginsengþOphiopogon japonicus,S.miltiorrhizaþDalbergia odorifera,and P.ginsengþSchisandra chinensis are also commonly used,as well as herbal family pairs such as AraliaceaeþLiliaceae,LauraceaeþLeguminosae,and AraliaceaeþSchisandraceae.Traditional treatment principles for preventing and treating heart diseases was most-commonly based on simultaneously treating the liver and heart and treating the lung and spleen secondarily for choosing herbal combinations.Conclusion:Most of the high-frequency Chinese herbs in the patents investigated belong to the high-frequency herbal families,and herb pairs were commonly selected to coincide with the commonly-used herbal family pairs.Low-frequency Chinese herbs were also used,but generally belonged to the high-frequency herbal families,and were therefore similar to the highfrequency herbs in terms of traditional categories of taste and channel entered.The results reflect the use of traditional principles of formula composition,and suggest that these principles may indeed be an effective guide for further research and development of Chinese herbal extract combinations to prevent and treat heart diseases.

Strain and Temperature Discrimination Based on a Mach-Zehnder Interferometer With Cascaded Single Mode Fibers

An in-fiber Mach-Zehnder interferometer is proposed for the discrimination of strain and temperature.The sensor is based on two cascaded standard single mode fibers using three peanut tapers fabricated by simple splicing.The cascaded structure excites more frequency components,which induce four sets of interference dips in the transmission spectrum.One set of the spectrum dips have different sensitivities to temperature and strain from those of the other three.The sensor can discriminate strain and temperature by monitoring the wavelength shifts of two spectrum dips.Repeated experiments are taken both for strain and temperature increasing and decreasing scenarios.Experimental results show that Dip 1 has an average strain sensitivity of-0.911 pm/με and an average temperature sensitivity of 49.98pm/℃.The strain sensitivity for Dip 2 is negligible and its average temperature sensitivity is 60.52pm/℃.The strain and temperature resolutions are±3.82με and±0.33℃.