Chemical Fingerprinting of Natural Products Using Advanced Analytical Techniques

Abstract

Natural products such as medicinal plants, essential oils, foods, honey, resins and marine extracts are complex mixtures that contain hundreds to thousands of chemically diverse constituents whose composition varies with species, geography, harvest time and processing. Chemical fingerprinting aims to capture this complexity in a characteristic and reproducible profile that can be used for identification, quality control, authentication and discovery of bioactive compounds. This article reviews the principles and workflow of chemical fingerprinting and the major analytical platforms used to generate fingerprints, including high-performance liquid chromatography, gas chromatography, mass spectrometry and its hyphenated forms, nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy and vibrational and optical spectroscopies. Sample preparation, chemometric data analysis, method validation and standardization are discussed as essential components of a reliable fingerprinting strategy. Applications in herbal medicine, food authentication and drug discovery are highlighted, together with current limitations such as matrix effects, reproducibility and compound identification. Emerging trends including molecular networking, ambient ionization and artificial intelligence are outlined as directions for future development.