Simultaneous determination of aconite alkaloids and ginsenosides using online solid phase extraction hyphenated with polarity switching ultra-high performance liquid chromatography coupled with tandem mass spectrometry

Abstract

Aconite alkaloids and ginsenosides have been demonstrated as the effective constituents in Shenfu injection (SFI), which is a widely used Chinese herbal formulation prepared from red ginseng and processed aconite root. Quality control is quite critical to meet the increasing demand of SFI in the market and to guarantee safety in clinics, in particular regarding the toxic aconite alkaloids. Given the significant merits of online solid phase extraction (SPE) for sample preparation, an online SPE-based method was developed to simultaneously quantify ten aconite alkaloids and thirteen ginsenosides in SFI using UHPLC-MS/MS. Because of their distinct ionization behaviors, polarity switching was implemented in the ion source domain with a scheduled program, and positive and negative ionization modes were applied for alkaloids and saponins, respectively. Quantitative terms of the proposed method with respect to linearity, limit of detection, lower limit of quantification, precision, and accuracy were evaluated, and the results indicated that the method is sensitive, convenient, and reliable. The developed method was successfully applied for the simultaneous determination of aconite alkaloids and ginsenosides in ten batches of SFI (SFI1-10). The validated method can be adopted as a meaningful tool for the quality control of SFI concerning aconite alkaloids and ginsenosides, and also it offers a reliable choice for the widely qualitative analysis of constituents in complex matrices being free from tedious sample preparation procedures.