Publications

Standardizing traditional herbal formulations poses significant challenges due to inherent variability in plant sources, environmentalconditions, and processing methods. This narrative review explores how metabolomics a powerful high-throughput analyticalapproach for comprehensive chemical profiling addresses these issues by enabling the identification and quantification of bioactivecompounds in complex herbal mixtures. Advanced analytical tools such as nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR), liquid chromatography–mass spectrometry (LC-MS), and gas chromatography–mass spectrometry (GC-MS) provide detailed metabolic fingerprintsthat underpin quality control and therapeutic consistency. Emerging techniques including desorption electrospray ionization–massspectrometry (DESI-MS), direct analysis in real-time mass spectrometry (DART-MS), single-cell metabolomics, and stable isotoperatio analysis (SIRA) enhance spatial and geographical specificity, offering rapid and minimally invasive profiling capabilities.Integration of metabolomics with chemometric tools such as principal component analysis (PCA) and partial least squares–discriminant analysis (PLS-DA), facilitates authentication and batch-to-batch consistency. Furthermore, artificial intelligence (AI) andmachine learning (ML) algorithms are increasingly employed to automate metabolite identification, predict pharmacological properties, and accelerate biomarker discovery. These advances collectively support evidence-based standardization and sustainabilityof herbal medicines, contributing to global healthcare integration. Key outcomes of this review include: identification of metabolomics as a cornerstone for quality assurance and authenticity of herbal products, evaluation of emerging analytical platforms forimproving formulation reproducibility, and recommendations for interdisciplinary collaboration and regulatory alignment.Literature included in this study was sourced from peer-reviewed articles published over the past decade in databases such asPubMed, Scopus, and Web of Science. Overall, the review underscores the pivotal role of metabolomics in transforming traditionalherbal practices into standardized, scalable, and personalized therapeutic interventions.