DNA barcoding for authentication of Orthosiphon stamineus herbal medicinal product using ITS2 nuclear marker originating from Malaysia

Orthosiphon stamineus (Misai Kucing) has become the focus of commercialization in Malaysia due to its potential health treatment benefits that can attract huge consumers' demand. Although the quality of herbal medicinal product (HMP) remains a major concern for consumers due to its high adulteration rate, there is insufficient testing done to determine whether the herb species used in HMP are as claimed in their ingredients. HMP authentication can be done by using a DNA barcoding approach which is species-specific. In this work, the first nuclear ITS2 barcode (279bp) from the fresh plant of O. stamineus (MKP) originating from Malaysia was successfully generated and deposited in Genbank (MT251295.1). The efficiency of the novel barcode in O. stamineus HMP authentication was tested in two samples, tea (MKT) and capsule (MKC) based on BLAST and NJ-tree analysis. The success of applying DNA barcoding by using ITS2 barcode generated in this work for HMP authentication makes it possible to complement conventional methods for O. stamineus HMP quality assurance testing and authentication in Malaysian herbal industry