Simultaneous determination of phenolic acids, anthraquinones, and flavonoids in the aerial part and the fruit of Xanthium sibiricum by LC- ESI- QTRAP-MS/MS

Background: Xanthium sibiricum is a well-known traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) that has been commonly used to treat rhinitis and related nasal diseases. The aim of this study was to develop a comprehensive analytical method based on high-performance liquid chromatography-electrospray ionization coupled with triple quadrupole-linear ion trap mass spectrometry (LC-ESI-QTRAP-MS/MS) for the simultaneous determination of phenolic acids, anthraquinones, and flavonoids in the aerial part and fruit of Xanthium sibiricum. Methods: The separation was completed on Agilent ZORBAX SB-C18 column (250 x 4.6 mm, 5 mu m) using methanol and 0.2% (v/v) aqueous formic acid as the mobile phase. The target components were analyzed in negative ion mode with accurate and sensitive multiple reaction monitoring (MRM) mode. Results: The correlation coefficients of all the calibration curves were higher than 0.9994. Relative standard deviations of intra-and inter-day precisions of the eighteen components were all lower than 2.87% and the recoveries were in the range from 97.73% to 101.82%. The validated method was successfully applied to possess forty Xanthium sibiricum samples (Xanthii Herba, Xanthii Fructus, and processed Xanthii Fructus) collected from different places in P. R. China. Furthermore, principal component analysis (PCA) was performed to evaluate and classify the samples according to the contents of the eighteen bioactive components. Conclusion: All the results demonstrated that the developed method was useful and could be applied for the overall assessment of the quality of Xanthii Herba and Xanthii Fructus.