Apocyni Veneti Folium (AVF) is a kind of staple traditional Chinese medicine with vast clinical consumption because of its positive effects. However, due to the habitats and adulterants, its quality is uneven. To control the quality of this medicinal herb, in this study, the quality of AVF was evaluated based on simultaneous determination of multiple bioactive constituents combined with multivariate statistical analysis. A reliable method based on ultra-fast liquid chromatography tandem triple quadrupole mass spectrometry (UFLC-QTRAP-MS/MS) was developed for the simultaneous determination of a total of 43 constituents, including 15 flavonoids, 6 organic acids, 13 amino acids, and 9 nucleosides in 41 Luobumaye samples from different habitats and commercial herbs. Furthermore, according to the contents of these 43 constituents, principal component analysis (PCA) was employed to classify and distinguish between AVF and its adulterants, leaves of Poacynum hendersonii (PHF), and gray relational analysis (GRA) was performed to evaluate the quality of the samples. The proposed method was successfully applied to the comprehensive quality evaluation of AVF, and all results demonstrated that the quality of AVF was higher than the PHF. This study will provide comprehensive information necessary for the quality control of AVF.
Keywords: Apocyni Veneti Folium; UFLC-QTRAP-MS/MS; multiple bioactive constituents; multivariate statistical analysis; simultaneous determination.