Abstract

The majority of traditional Chinese medicine components are derived from herbal plants. The medicinal quality of herbal plants varies according to growing area, herb collection portions, herb collection season, and herb processing procedure. Polysaccharides are important components of herb plants, and their manufacture is governed by the availability of nourishment and dictated by a variety of environmental conditions. Polysaccharides extracted from various Chinese herbs have attracted a lot of interest in recent decades due to their key biological activities such as anti-tumor, anti-oxidant, anti-diabetic, radiation protection, antiviral, hypolipidemic, and immunomodulatory properties. Surprisingly, various batches of the same plant can yield polysaccharide fractions with modest changes in molecular weight, monosaccharide content, glycosidic connections, and biological activities. Despite these differences, a vast variety of bioactive polysaccharides derived from various types of traditional Chinese herbs have been purified, characterised, and published. This study gives in-depth look at the most recent polysaccharide extraction methods as well as the methodologies employed for monosaccharide compositional analysis and polysaccharide structure characterisation. Most importantly, the chemical properties and biological activities of polysaccharides derived from well-known traditional Chinese herbs such as Astragalus membranaceus, Ginseng, Lycium barbarum, Angelica sinensis, Cordyceps sinensis, and Ophiopogon japonicas has been discussed. The published findings show that polysaccharides derived from traditional Chinese herbs play an essential role in their medicinal uses, laying the groundwork for future study, development, and implementation of these polysaccharides as functional foods and therapies in contemporary medicine.