Quality suitability modeling of volatile oil in Chinese Materia Medica – Based on maximum entropy and independent weight coefficient method: Case studies of Atractylodes lancea, Angelica sinensis, Curcuma longa and Atractylodes macrocephala

Abstract Volatile oils are an important class of active constituents that have anti-bacterial, antipyretic and nerve-soothing effects in Chinese medicinal materials. It is often a characteristic constituent that indicates the quality of Chinese herbal medicines. How the ecological factors influence volatile oil has important theoretical and practical value for the genuine medicinal materials. This study selected Atractylodes lancea, Angelica sinensis, Curcuma longa and Atractylodes macrocephala as research objects in China, after Pearson correlative analysis between volatile oil and ecological factors, volatile oil was selected as the evaluating index and the monthly precipitation from March to June as the independent variable, maximum entropy and improved independent weight coefficient method were used to analyze the variation of volatile oil with the changes in the environment. Finally the volatile oil distribution maps were drafted. The results suggested that: (1) the precipitation in the early growth season had an important effect on the accumulation of volatile oil, but the effects were not the same. (2) The volatile oil particular prediction model was established by the factors that were most relevant to the volatile oil, and the universal prediction model was established by the precipitation from March to June. The results of the latter were highly consistent with those of the former, which showed that the universal prediction model had an effective predictive ability.