Profile

Formulator of the harvest-timing rule for Eucommia male flowers and researcher of Eucommia rubber composites.

Story

Dong Juan'e, born in 1968, is a professor, doctoral supervisor and Head of the Department of Biological Sciences at the College of Life Sciences, Northwest A&F University, and a member of the Japan Eucommia Research Association. She has long engaged in research on Eucommia secondary metabolism and the extraction and separation of natural products. She systematically studied the accumulation patterns of active components in Eucommia male flowers and concluded that the bud stage and full-bloom stage are the optimal harvest periods - a 'knack' that has become the raw-material rule followed by Lueyang County's entire Eucommia male-flower industry.

She has achieved fruitful results in the separation of total glycosides and flavonoids from Eucommia leaves by macroporous adsorption resin, HPLC quality control of active components in Eucommia male-flower tea, and fermentation processing of Eucommia leaves. She has also extended her research into Eucommia rubber materials, developing biodegradable Eucommia rubber/modified rosin thermoplastic composites, as well as Eucommia rubber nanocomposite films and dressings with UV-blocking, antibacterial and wound-healing functions - expanding the application of Eucommia rubber in agricultural protection and biomedicine.

Milestones

• In 2003, published research on Eucommia leaf fermentation methods, optimizing the processing of Eucommia raw juice
• In May 2024, invited to give the academic report 'Research on high-value utilization of Eucommia resources and creation of new products' at Shaanxi University of Technology
• Concurrently a member of the Japan Eucommia Research Association, a council member of the Shaanxi Provincial Research Society of Traditional Chinese Medicine, and an advisory committee member of the Shaanxi Provincial Association of Traditional Chinese Medicine

Key Contributions

• Determined the bud stage and full-bloom stage as the optimal harvest periods for Eucommia male flowers, now the raw-material 'rule' followed by the Eucommia male-flower industry in Lueyang, Shaanxi
• In 2006, published research on the one-step separation of total glycosides and flavonoids from Eucommia leaves by macroporous adsorption resin (Transactions of the CSAE, cited 26 times)
• In 2007, published in the Chinese Journal of Chromatography the simultaneous separation and determination of geniposidic acid and chlorogenic acid in Eucommia male flowers by RP-HPLC
• Demonstrated the good in vitro antioxidant activity of Eucommia male-flower polysaccharides; developed Eucommia rubber/fullerene and alginate nanocomposite films and wound-healing dressings
• Granted the invention patent 'A preparation method of a Eucommia rubber/modified rosin thermoplastic composite' (CN114456452B)