Professor De-an Guo to Receive ABC's Norman R. Farnsworth Excellence in Botanical Research Award

AUSTIN, Texas, Feb. 18, 2013 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- The American Botanical Council (ABC) recognizes this year's ABC Norman R. Farnsworth Excellence in Botanical Research Award recipient, Professor De-an Guo, Ph.D., of Shanghai, China.

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Over the course of his career, Dr. Guo's research has centered on Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) quality control, biochemistry, and metabolism; his phytochemical investigations of traditional Chinese herbal medicines have resulted in the identification of 100 new chemical entities. In addition to his professorship, Dr. Guo serves as director of the State Engineering Laboratory for TCM Standardization Technology and as director of the Shanghai Research Center for TCM Modernization at the Shanghai Institute of Materia Medica of the Chinese Academy of Sciences. He earned his doctorate in pharmacognosy from Beijing Medical University's School of Pharmaceutical Sciences in 1990, and conducted his postdoctoral studies in the department of chemistry and biochemistry at Texas Tech University in Lubbock, Texas.

Among his many accomplishments, including more than 430 published scientific papers to date, Dr. Guo acted as the vice-editor-in-chief of the 2005 edition of the Pharmacopoeia of the People's Republic of China and editor-in-chief of the 2010 edition. At present, he sits on the editorial boards of several highly respected international scientific journals, including Planta Medica and Phytomedicine. Dr. Guo is an expert committee member of the United States Pharmacopeia and a member of the ABC Advisory Board.

"Professor Guo is not only an established scientist, he has provided leadership in the modernization of TCM," said past recipient of ABC's Farnsworth Award, Professor Ikhlas Khan, Ph.D., a research professor of pharmacognosy and associate director of the National Center for Natural Products Research at the University of Mississippi. "He is a deserving recipient and I am proud to call him my friend."

The Excellence in Botanical Research Award's namesake is ABC's co-founding Board of Trustees member, the late Professor Norman R. Farnsworth, Ph.D., a research professor of pharmacognosy and senior university scholar in the College of Pharmacy at the University of Illinois – Chicago. When Professor Farnsworth died in 2011 at the age of 81, the medicinal plant community lost one of its greatest champions. ABC will continue to present this award each year to a person or institution that has made significant contributions to ethnobotanical and/or pharmacognostic research (i.e., research on drugs of natural origin, usually from plants).

"We are most pleased to be able to recognize and honor Professor Guo for his outstanding achievements in the chemistry and pharmacology of many traditional Chinese medicinal plants," said ABC Founder and Executive Director Mark Blumenthal. "He is clearly one of the leading figures in scientific medicinal plant research in China, a country with a vast spectrum of traditionally used medicinal plants that are undergoing modern scientific research and validation."

"I am very pleased and honored to receive the high distinction of ABC's Norman R. Farnsworth Excellence in Botanical Research Award. I would like to thank ABC and the nominating committee who selected me for this award in 2013," said Dr. Guo. "This reflects the world-wide coverage of ABC's Farnsworth Award," he continued.

Previous recipients of ABC's Norman R. Farnsworth Excellence in Botanical Research Award include Joseph M. Betz, Ph.D., of the Office of Dietary Supplements at the US National Institutes of Health (2006); Professor Edzard Ernst, MD, Ph.D., formerly of the Peninsula Medical School at the University of Exeter in the United Kingdom (2007); Professor Hildebert Wagner, Ph.D., of the Institute for Pharmaceutical Biology in Munich, Germany (2008); Dr. Khan (2009); Professor Rudolf Bauer, Ph.D., head of the Institute of Pharmaceutical Sciences at the Karl-Franzens University of Graz in Austria (2010); Professor A. Douglas Kinghorn, Ph.D., chair of the department of medicinal chemistry and pharmacognosy in the College of Pharmacy at Ohio State University (2011); and Professor Djaja D. Soejarto, Ph.D., of the College of Pharmacy at the University of Illinois – Chicago (2012).

Dr. Guo will receive the ABC Norman R. Farnsworth Excellence in Botanical Research Award at the 8^th Annual ABC Botanical Celebration and Awards Ceremony in March in Anaheim, California. The ABC event occurs during the annual Nutracon nutrition, natural products, and dietary supplements conference and Natural Products Expo West.

The ABC Botanical Celebration and Awards Ceremony is underwritten by generous contributions from the following members of the herb, dietary supplement, and natural products industry (i.e., raw material suppliers, supplement and tea manufacturers, analytical laboratories, a law firm, an insurer, a media company, and a trade organization):

Alkemists Laboratories
Amin Talati, LLC
ChromaDex
EuroPharma
Grifcon Enterprises
Horphag Research
Indena USA, Inc.
Martin Bauer Group
MegaFood
Natural Factors Nutritional Products
New Chapter, Inc.
New Hope Natural Media
PlusPharma, Inc.
RFI Ingredients, LLC
Traditional Medicinals, Inc.
United Natural Products Alliance

About ABC
Founded in 1988, the American Botanical Council is a leading international nonprofit organization addressing research and educational issues regarding herbs, teas, medicinal plants, essential oils, and other beneficial plant-derived materials. ABC's members include academic researchers and educators; libraries; health professionals and medical institutions; government agencies; members of the herb, dietary supplement, cosmetic, and pharmaceutical industries; journalists; consumers; and others in more than 81 countries. The organization occupies a historic 2.5-acre site in Austin, Texas, where it publishes the peer-reviewed quarterly journal HerbalGram, the monthly e-publication HerbalEGram, the weekly e-newsletter "Herbal News & Events," HerbClips (summaries of scientific and clinical publications), reference books, and other educational materials. ABC also hosts HerbMedPro, a powerful herbal database, covering scientific and clinical publications on more than 250 herbs. ABC also co-produces the "Herbal Insights" segment for Healing Quest, a television series on PBS.

ABC is tax-exempt under section 501(c)(3) of the IRS Code. Information: Contact ABC at P.O. Box 144345, Austin, TX 78714-4345, Phone: 512-926-4900. Website: www.herbalgram.org.

SOURCE American Botanical Council