Chemical profiling of Honghua Xiaoyao tablet and simultaneous determination of its quality markers by liquid chromatography–tandem mass spectrometry combined with chemometrics methods

Abstract

Discovering marker components of traditional Chinese medicine formulas is challenging because of the hundreds of components they inherently contain. This study first proposed a reliable and validated method for the comprehensive profiling of chemical constituents in Honghua Xiaoyao tablet by using high-performance liquid chromatography coupled with mass spectrometry. After searching within the in-house library, a total of 55 constituents were unambiguously characterized or tentatively identified through reference standards and by comparing mass spectrometry data with literature values. Quantitative analysis of 14 compounds, which were selected as the quality marker components based on a serum pharmacochemistry study, has been performed by triple-quardrupole mass spectrometry technique. Multiple chemometric methods, including principal components analysis and hierarchical cluster analysis, were subsequently used to analyze the quantitative results, classify samples from three manufacturers, and distinguish the analytical markers. In method validation results, 14 quality marker compounds have shown good linearity (R 2 ≥ 0.9965) with a relative wide concentration range and acceptable recovery at 98.39-102.46%. The proposed approach provides the chemical evidence for revealing the material basis of Honghua Xiaoyao tablet, and establishes a reliable statistical analysis-based strategy of quality marker investigation for controlling its quality.

A comprehensive quality evaluation method of Corydalis yanhusuo by HPLC fingerprints, chemometrics, and correlation analysis

“…The similarity values (Supporting information Table S4) of 20 batches of C. yanhusuo samples were all above 0.96, indicating all samples from different areas shared similar components. The SA was difficult to distinguish C. yanhusuo samples, therefore, we further used chemometrics methods to analyze these samples including HCA, PCA, and PLS‐DA [30–32].…”

Integrated Metabolomics and Network Pharmacology Revealed Hong-Hua-Xiao-Yao Tablet’s Effect of Mediating Hormone Synthesis in the Treatment of Mammary Gland Hyperplasia

“…The animal experiment used to study the chemicals absorbed in rat plasma was previously described (Mi et al, 2020). Briefly, the HHXYT sample was suspended in 0.5% carboxymethylcellulose…”

“…Cell Counting Kit-8 (CCK-8) was purchased from Shanghai Beyotime Biotechnology Co., Ltd. (Shanghai, China). HHXYT (batch number: 190106), the same batch named as "PZ-5" in our previous study (Mi et al, 2020), was supplied by Puzheng Pharmaceutical Co., Ltd. (Jiangxi, China). The contents of fourteen quality marker compounds of HHXYT were quantified by HPLC-QQQ-MS (Table 1).…”

“…Chemical profiling of HHXYT has been previously elucidated by high-performance liquid chromatography combined with mass spectrometry technique, and 55 constituents were characterized. Moreover, in our earlier study, 14 components that were identified as potential HHXYT quality markers were quantified using highperformance liquid chromatography-tandem triple quadrupole mass spectrometry (HPLC-QQQ-MS) technique (Mi et al, 2020). In clinical trials, HHXYT was found to be effective in the treatment of perimenopausal syndrome, ovarian syndrome, menstrual disorders, as well as mammary gland hyperplasia (Wang, 2012;Pei et al, 2016;Chen et al, 2020).…”

Discovery and validation of quality markers of Fructus Aurantii against acetylcholinesterase using metabolomics and bioactivity assays

“…The selection of active markers for the quality evaluation and control of traditional Chinese medicine remains still be problematic because common indicators are usually irrelevant to the therapeutic effects of herbs or medicinal plants. As a novel quality-control method, qualitymarkers of traditional Chinese medicine are defined as the inherent chemical components that are used for the quality control (QC) of traditional Chinese medicine or medicinal plants [12][13][14]. Their biological activities are closely related to safety and therapeutic effects [15].…”