Research is an ongoing process, and in the discipline of how herbs impact human health, research continues to accelerate. Areas of study also include toxicity, pharmacology, extraction technology and more. An esteemed association collates the most significant research updates on commonly marketed and consumed botanicals.
The American Herbal Products Association (AHPA) has announced it recently issued an update to its Botanical Safety Handbook, an online resource, to include new information for four herbs.
Specifically, Gotu kola (Centella asiatica) information includes a new clinical trial, a case report, and pharmacology and toxicity studies. The entry for lemon balm (Melissa officinalis) now includes information about new clinical trials, pharmacological studies, and toxicity studies. The bilberry (Vaccinium myrtillus) entry now includes a recent review of clinical trials and pharmacology studies. The passionflower (Passiflora incarnata) revision features a new clinical trial, a case report, animal pharmacology, and reproductive toxicity studies.
AHPA’s Botanical Safety Handbooks is available through a subscription; it contains information for more than 500 species of herbs and is highly useful for retailers and their staffs who sell botanical supplements and herbal infused beverages.
The American Botanical Council just launched a revamped website, two years in the making. In addition to having a new look, ABC’s new website is built on a more powerful and intuitive platform resulting in a website that is mobile responsive, has improved navigation, and benefits from an elastic search engine that ‘learns’ from the users to provide better search results over time.
The website now features the ability to explore the contents on multiple devices, a more user-friendly content navigation which facilitates dynamic content, and more sophisticated application programming interface (API) software.
Gayle Engels, ABC’s Special Projects Director, commented, “As the third iteration of ABC’s website since 1995, there was a great deal of restructuring to do to unite all the content into a user-friendly, consistent whole. While we will continue to make improvements, we hope site visitors enjoy the fresh look and refinements to the site architecture.”
