High-throughput Phenotyping Of Salviae Miltiorrhizae Radix Et Rhizoma Reveals Correlation Between Its Agronomic Traits And Quality

Backgrounds and Objectives:“Bian zhuang lun zhi” is the golden rules for the classification of the traditional Chinese medicine.“Bian zhuang” refers to the visible or audible traits of the medicinal materials including shape,color,fragrance,flavor,surface features,texture,and cross-sectional characteristics,etc.“Lun zhi” means to judge the quality of herbs according to the above traits.Based on “Bian zhuang lun zhi”,the current commercial specification was established.In this study,the current standards were verified.We described the morphological features and chemical traits of Danshen of Danshen(Salviae miltiorrhizae Radix et Rhizoma)using highthroughput imaging methods and metabolic analysis.The correlations between these traits were constructed.Thus,certain specific traits were selected for prediction the quality of this herb.The results will also lead to the in-depth knowledge for the explanation of qualities of Danshen from the perspective of plant physiology.Results:1)Firstly,the Danshen samples were classified according to the current commercial specification.On the other hand,the contents of tanshinones and phenolic acids were determined using the LC-MS/MS and UPLC-Q-TOF/MS methods.As a result,the content level of effective compounds in Danshen samples did not show a good consistency to the classification,which indicating the limitation and irrationality of the current commercial specification for Danshen.2)The morphological features of Danshen were observed and modeled by deep phenotyping.Following,the phenotypic traits were combined with metabolic traits for the construction of correlation network and fitting modeling,which could be used for predicting the qualities of Danshen.As a result,we found some certain phenotypic traits showed significant correlation to the production of effective compounds and were regarded as effective indication features.They are the largest diameter,colorimetric value,and external and internal ratio.3)The tissue specific distribution of active compounds of danshen was profiled through the metabonomics analysis combined with the existing transcriptional data.Tanshinones were mainly accumulated in the periderm cell layers,and the phenolic acids were mostly distributed in the xylem and phloem.Conclusions:The study identified some quality traits by completing the homogenization analysis of the morphology and chemical features and building the correlation between morphology and chemical components.Thus,we could give some supplementary advices for the commercial specification of Danshen.The study also provided important phenotypic traits as the key traits for further breeding of Danshen.