The metabolism and distribution of imidazole alkaloids from Lepidium meyenii (Maca) in mouse by matrix-assisted laser desorption/ionization mass spectrometry imaging

Abstract

In this paper, matrix-assisted laser desorption/ionization mass spectrometry imaging (MALDI-MSI) was visualized to investigate the metabolism and distribution of Lepidiline A (1,3-dibenzyl-2,4,5-trimethylimidazolium chloride) and Lepidiline B (1,3-dibenzyl-4,5-dimethylimidazolium chloride) from Lepidium meyenii (Maca) in heart, liver, spleen and kidney tissues of mice. The results show that the main metabolic pathways of two imidazole alkaloids in heart were the same as those in liver and kidney of mice, however, there were few metabolic distributions in spleen tissues. MALDI-MSI distribution of imidazole alkaloids in tissues at 3 h after oral Maca extract was clearly observed by high resolution mass spectrometry. Two imidazole alkaloids were uniformly distributed in heart, cortex of liver and medulla of kidney, but not in medulla of liver and cortex of kidney. This label-free imaging technique in situ will contribute to studying pharmacological mechanism of imidazole alkaloids.