ABSTRACT
INTRODUCTION The genus Salvia has a variety of more than one hundred species distributed in several regions in China. Thirty of them are used as traditional and folk medicines (Huang 1991). The dried root of Salvia miltiorrhiza, called Danshen, is one of the most well known traditional Chinese medicines among these species. It has the effect of promoting blood circulation and removing stasis, and is widely used for the treat ment of coronary heart diseases, cerebrovascular diseases, hepatitis, hepatocirrhosis, chronic renal failure, dysmenorrhea and neurasthenic insomnia. The chemical con stituents of S. miltiorrhiza have been studied for more than fifty years. But the studies have mainly been focused on the lipophylic diterpenoid quinones. According to traditional Chinese medicinal prescriptions it is used as a decoction. Since the seventies injections of Danshen have been used for the treatment of angina pectoris, myocardial infarction and various types of hepatitis. So there should still be other water soluble active components which are responsible for these biological activities. During our investigation on the biologically active components we isolated various polyphenolic acids from the aqueous extract of S. miltiorrhiza and other herbal medicines from this genus. Pharmacological studies of these polyphenolic acids showed potent antioxidant activities (Liu 1992).
