Medicinal foods and plants have been widely used as foods, dietary supplements, or medicines worldwide and demonstrated a diversified health benefits with a long history. The raw materials and finished products of botanicals are becoming increasingly popular to public and scientific communities, highlighting the need for analytical methodology to ensure the quality. The safety and efficacy of these medicinal natural products are closely associated to their identify, authenticity, and quality, which in turn relate to many factors, such as geographical conditions (soil, sunlight, precipitation, and air) and postgrowth factors (harvesting, storage, transportation, and manufacturing processes). As such, it is always a challenge for scientific researchers to evaluate safety and efficacy of the complicated plant matrix.

We invite authors to submit original research articles and review articles that will focus on the novel analytical method development and validation, methodology and instrumentation improvement, chemical characterization of plant raw materials, extracts, fractions, major or bioactive constitutes, and finished products. Potential topics include, but are not limited to:

• Development and validation of a novel analytical method for phytochemicals, particularly major components or bioactive components, such as flavonoids, terpenoids, phenols, saponins, coumarins, and alkaloids
• Chemical characterization of bioactive constituents
• Chemical authentication of botanicals
• Extraction, separation, purification, and quantitation of chemical marker compounds
• Establishment of analytical method for evaluation of effects of processing, packaging, and storage on the composition , quality, and safety of foods and dietary supplements
• Instrumental method improvement
• Chemical analysis of metabolites and byproducts, food additives, contaminants, and so forth
• Review of recent advance of analytical, phytochemical, and instrumental methodology for plants
• New chemical research related to efficacy, metabolism, and toxicology
• New biological activities of characterized phytochemicals
• Development of quality control of raw material and finished products

Before submission authors should carefully read over the journal's Author Guidelines, which are located at http://www.hindawi.com/journals/jamc/guidelines/. Prospective authors should submit an electronic copy of their complete manuscript through the journal Manuscript Tracking System at http://mts.hindawi.com/submit/journals/jamc/chem/ according to the following timetable: