Simultaneous determination of six active metabolites in Astragalus mongholicus (Fisch.) Bge. under salt stress by ultra-pressure liquid chromatography with tandem mass spectrometry.

Yang Liu,Yu Wang,Jia Liu,Zhong-Hua Tang,Ann Abozeid

doi:10.1186/s40064-016-2638-y

Yang Liu, Yu Wang + Show 3 more

Open Access

https://doi.org/10.1186/s40064-016-2638-y

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Journal: SpringerPlus	Publication Date: Jun 30, 2016
Citations: 18	License type: CC BY 4.0

Affiliation: Northeast Forestry University, Menoufia University

Abstract

Astragalus membranaceus Bge. var. mongholicus (Bge.) Hsiao (A. mongholicus, family Leguminosae) is one of the most important traditional Chinese herbs because it contains lots of bioactive metabolites, which have beneficial and pharmacological effects on health. Simultaneously, it has been proved to be a salt-tolerant plant—one of the potential species to control the soil salinization. Therefore, a sensitive and specific ultra-pressure liquid chromatography coupled with tandem mass spectrometric (UPLC-MS/MS) method was developed and validated for the simultaneous determination of six main bioactive metabolites, astragaloside IV, cycloastragenol, calycosin-7-O-β-d-glucoside, calycosin, ononin and formononetin in different organs of A. mongholicus. The detection was accomplished by multiple-reaction monitoring (MRM) scanning via electrospray ionization source operating in the positive ionization mode. Calibration curves offered linear ranges of two orders of magnitude with R2 > 0.99. The method was fully validated for the linearity, intra-day and inter day precisions, accuracy, recovery, matrix effect and stability. Then this method was successfully applied to detect the content of major bioactive metabolites in different plant organs of A. mongholicus under salt stress. Significant variations in the content of six bioactive metabolites were observed after been processed by different levels of salinity in different part of plant. The results support for further exploration of the salt-tolerant mechanisms in A. mongholicus and its possibility as the species that control the soil salinization. Meanwhile, we established a UPLC-MS/MS assay of the trace components in seedling of A. mongholicus in this study.

Highlights

Radix Astragali, A widely used Chinese Herbal Medicine, is derived from the dried roots of Astragalus mongholicus (Fisch.) Bge. (Zu et al 2009)
We developed and applied the rapid and sensitive UltraPerformance LC (UPLC)-MS method for simultaneous determination of astragaloside IV, cycloastragenol, calycosin-7-O-βd-glucoside, calycosin, ononin and formononetin in A. mongholicus under different levels of salt stresses
Water used for the UPLC–MS/MS analysis was prepared with a Milli-Q water purification system procured from Millipore (Milford, MA, USA)

Summary

Introduction

Radix Astragali, A widely used Chinese Herbal Medicine, is derived from the dried roots of Astragalus mongholicus (Fisch.) Bge. (Zu et al 2009). Liu et al SpringerPlus (2016) 5:927 system, and promote health activities and skin growth, are the major isoflavonoids in A. mongholicus (Xiao et al 2004; Krasteva et al 2015). Cycloastragenol is the synthetic precursor compound of astragaloside IV. All of them could be the marker compounds for the chemical evaluation of A. mongholicus (Yesilada et al 2005; Pu et al 2015). Formononetin, ononin, calycosin and calycosin-7-O-β-d-glucoside, are the most important metabolites in isoflavonoids biosynthesis pathway (Xu et al 2011); astragaloside IV and cycloastragenol, are the essential metabolites of triterpene saponin biosynthesis pathway (Park et al 2015). Synthesis or decomposition of these compounds has important implications for the quality of A. mongholicus as medicines (Zheng et al 2015; Liu et al 2015a)

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