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Ethnopharmacological Relevance: Polygonum chinense Linn., a folk medicine, has long been used for the treatment of diarrhea and enteritis in southwestern China. However, the components responsible for its anti-diarrheal activity are still poorly understood., Aim of the Study: To determine anti-diarrheal activities of Polygonum chinense L. and to identify its active components through bioactivity-guided isolation technique., Materials and Methods: Animals were orally administered with the extract of Polygonum chinense L. The anti-diarrheal effects of 75% ethanol extract, four fractions with different polarities from 75% ethanol extract, different eluates collected from Diaion HP-20 macroporous resin chromatography, ellagic acid and corilagin, were examined based on mouse models of castor oil- and magnesium sulfate-induced diarrhea., Results: The results showed that the 75% ethanol extract of Polygonum chinense L. exhibited significant anti-diarrheal activities in a dose-dependent manner in two mouse models. Through in vivo bioactivity-guided fractionation processes, n-butanol and aqueous fractions were found to exhibit prominent anti-diarrheal activities, and two major compounds, ellagic acid and corilagin, from these active fractions were found to possess anti-diarrheal effects., Conclusion: Present study provides evidence of the utilization of Polygonum chinense L. for diarrhea, and ellagic acid and corilagin are two components contributing to the anti-diarrheal effect., (© 2013 Elsevier Ireland Ltd. All rights reserved.)

The incidence of inflammatory bowel disease, a relapsing intestinal condition whose precise etiology is still unclear, has continually increased over recent years. Metabolic profiling is an effective method with high sample throughput that can detect and identify potential biomarkers, and thus may be useful in investigating the pathogenesis of inflammatory bowel disease. In this study, using a metabonomics approach, a pilot study based on ultra-performance liquid chromatography coupled with electrospray ionization quadrupole time-of-flight mass spectrometry (UPLC-ESI-QTOF-MS) was performed to characterize the metabolic profile of plasma and urine samples of rats with experimental colitis induced by 2,4,6-trinitrobenzene sulfonic acid. Acquired metabolic profile data were processed by multivariate data analysis for differentiation and screening of potential biomarkers. Five metabolites were identified in urine: two tryptophan metabolites [4-(2-aminophenyl)-2,4-dioxobutanoic acid and 4,6-cihydroxyquinoline], two gut microbial metabolites (phenyl-acetylglycine and p-cresol glucuronide), and the bile acid 12α-hydroxy-3-oxocholadienic acid. Seven metabolites were identified in plasma: three members of the bile acid/alcohol group (cholic acid, 12α-hydroxy-3-oxocholadienic acid and cholestane-3,7,12,24,25-pentol) and four lysophosphatidylcholines [LysoPC(20:4), LysoPC(16:0), LysoPC(18:1) and LysoPC(18:0)]. These metabolites are associated with damage of the intestinal barrier function, microbiota homeostasis, immune modulation and the inflammatory response, and play important roles in the pathogenesis of inflammatory bowel disease. Our results positively support application of the metabonomic approach in study of the pathophysiological mechanism of inflammatory bowel disease., (© 2012 The Authors Journal compilation © 2012 FEBS.)

A high-sensitivity ultra-performance liquid-chromatography (UPLC) coupled with tandem mass spectrometric method was developed for simultaneous quantification and confirmation of triptolide in both zebrafish embryos and the aqueous-exposure solution on a tandem quadrupole mass spectrometer (TQ-MS). This was achieved by performing quantification using the multiple reaction monitoring (MRM) acquisition with simultaneous characterization of the MRM peak using product ion confirmation (PIC) acquisition as it elutes from the chromatographic system. Separation was achieved on a 1.7 µm C(18) UPLC column using 0.1% formic acid water-acetonitrile mobile phase with a cycle time of 6 min. The linear range of 0.115-360 ng/mL, and lower limits of detection of 0.02 ng/mL and quantification of 0.064 ng/mL were established. This method was successfully applied to determine the time course of triptolide absorption by zebrafish embryos and the amount of triptolide remaining in the culture medium after administration of two triptolide dosages at three time points. This coupled MRM with PIC approach could provide both qualitative and quantitative results without the need for repetitive analyses. This resulted in the reduction of further confirmative experiments and analytical time, and ultimately increased laboratory productivity., (Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.)

A rapid, but sensitive and selective method for simultaneous screening and quantification of toxic pyrrolizidine alkaloids (PAs) by ultra performance liquid-chromatography (UPLC) coupled with tandem mass spectrometry (MS/MS) on a tandem quadrupole mass spectrometer (TQ-MS) is described. This was accomplished by incorporating the precursor ion scan (PIS) acquisition and multiple reaction monitoring (MRM) acquisition in the same UPLC-MS/MS run. Notably, the developed PIS approach for detecting two pairs of characteristic product ions at m/z 120/138 or 168/150, allowed specific identification of toxic retronecine and otonecine types PAs. This PIS method is highly sensitive with over 10-fold sensitivity improvement upon previously published LC-MS method. Moreover, this new approach is suitable for high sample throughput and was applied to the screening and quantifying toxic PAs in 22 samples collected from seven Parasenecio species and four Senecio species. In addition, coupling the MRM with PIS approach generated quantitative results equivalent to those obtained by conventional MRM-only approach. This coupled MRM with PIS approach could provide both qualitative and quantitative results without the need of repetitive analyses., (Copyright © 2010 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.)

Polycyclic polyprenylated acylphloroglucinols (PPAPs) are a group of natural products isolated from different Garcinia species with a wide range of important biological activities. In this study, an ultra performance liquid chromatography (UPLC) coupled to photodiode-array detection and quadrupole time-of-flight mass spectrometry (Q-TOF) method was developed to characterize 16 PPAPs in 10 Garcinia species. In source dissociation techniques based on cone voltage fragmentation were used to fragment the deprotonated molecules and multiple mass spectrometry (MS/MS) using ramping collision energy were used to further break down the resulting product ions. The resulting characteristic fragment ions were generated by cleavage of C1-C5 bond and C7-C8 bond through concerted pericyclic reaction, which is especially valuable for differentiating three types of PPAPs isomers. As such, two new PPAPs isomers present in minor amount in the extracts of Garcinia oblongifolia were tentatively characterized by comparing their tandem mass spectra to the known ones. In addition, an UPLC-Q-TOF-MS method was validated for the quantitative determination of PPAPs. The method exhibited limits of detection from 2.7 to 21.4 ng mL(-1) and intra-day and inter-day variations were less than 3.7% and the recovery was in the range of 89-107% with RSD less than 9.0%. This UPLC-Q-TOF-MS method has successfully been applied to quantify 16 PPAPs in 32 samples of 10 Garcinia species, which were found to be a rich source of PPAPs., (Copyright © 2010 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.)

A statistic approach using response surface methodology (RSM) for optimization of the ultra-high performance liquid chromatography (UHPLC) gradient and ionization response of electrospray ionization mass spectrometry (ESI-MS) to analyze the main alkaloids from the plant matrices of six Meconopsi species is presented. The optimization was performed with Box-Behnken designs (BBD) and the multicriteria response variables were described using global Derringer's desirability. Four parameters of UHPLC and six major parameters of ESI-MS were investigated for their contribution to analytes separation and response, leading to a total of 27 and 54 experiments being performed for each instrument, respectively. Quantitative analysis of four main alkaloids in nine samples from six Meconopsis species was employed to evaluate the statistical significance of the parameters on UHPLC-QTOF/ESI-MS analytes response. The results indicated that the optimized UHPLC-QTOF-MS method is very sensitive with the limit of detections (LODs) ranging from 0.5 to 0.1 ng/ml. The overall intra-day and the inter-day variations were less than 2.45%. The recovery of the method was in the range of 94.3-104.8% with RSD less than 4.0%. This approach has important implication in sensitivity enhancement of the ultra-trace determination of alkaloids from complex matrixes in the fields of natural products, metabolomics and pharmacokinetics.

An on-line ultra-high-performance liquid chromatography (UHPLC) coupled with photodiode-array detection and quadrupole time-of-flight tandem mass spectrometry (QTOF-MS/MS) method has been optimized and established for the qualitative and quantitative analysis of the important diterpenoids in the methanol extracts of 12 Salvia species. Specific marker components were identified for the classification of the Salvia samples by principal component analysis. The accurate mass measurement within 3 ppm error for all the protonated molecules and subsequent fragment ions offers higher quality structural information for interpretation of fragmentation pathways of various groups of diterpenoids. Thus, a total of 21 diterpenoids from different Salvia species were separated within 10 min, and were unequivocally or tentatively identified via comparisons with authentic standards and literature. This UHPLC-QTOF-MS/MS method was validated to be sensitive, precise and accurate with the limit of detections at 3.0-16 ng/ml, and the overall intra-day and the inter-day variations less than 3%. The recovery of the method was in the range of 96.2-101.8%, with relative standard deviation (RSD) less than 3.0%. The results demonstrated that the qualitative and quantitative differences in diterpenoids were not only useful for chemotaxonomy in some Salvia species but also for the standardization and differentiation of large numbers of similar samples.

In this study, an ultra-performance liquid chromatography/photo-diode-array/quadrupole time-of-flight mass spectrometry (UPLC-PDA-QTOFMS) based chemical profiling method was established for rapid global quality evaluation of Radix Paeoniae. By virtue of the high resolution, high speed of UPLC and the accurate mass measurement of TOFMS, a total of 40 components including 29 monoterpene glycosides, 8 galloyl glucoses and 3 phenolic compounds were simultaneously separated within 12min, and identified through the matching of empirical molecular formulae with those of published components in the in-house library, and were further elucidated by adjusted lower energy collision-induced dissociation (CID) mass spectra. Among forty components, five monoterpene glycoside sulfonates were identified as novel components. The established method was successfully applied to rapidly and globally compare the quality of Radix Paeoniae Alba and Radix Paeoniae Rubra, two post-harvesting handled products of Radix Paeoniae. Together with paeoniflorin sulfonate, five newly assigned monoterpene glycoside sulfonates were characteristic markers to detect non-official sulfur dioxide gas fumigated Radix Paeoniae Alba samples. It could be concluded that UPLC-PDA-QTOFMS based chemical profiling is a powerful approach for the global quality evaluation of Radix Paeoniae as well as other herbal medicines.