Determination of three steroidal saponins from Ophiopogon japonicus (Liliaceae) via high-performance liquid chromatography with mass spectrometry

Abstract

A simple and accurate analytical method was developed for simultaneous quantification of three steroidal saponins in the roots of Ophiopogon japonicus via high-performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) with mass spectrometry (MS) in this study. Separation was performed on a Tigerkin C₁₈ column and detection was performed by mass spectrometry. A mobile phase consisted of 0.02% formic acid in water (v/v) and 0.02% formic acid in acetonitrile (v/v) was used with a flow rate of 0.5 mL min⁻¹. The quantitative HPLC–MS method was validated for linearity, precision, repeatability, stability, recovery, limits of detection and quantification. This developed method provides good linearity (r >0.9993), intra- and inter-day precisions (RSD <4.18%), repeatability (RSD <5.05%), stability (RSD <2.08%) and recovery (93.82–102.84%) for three steroidal saponins. It could be considered as a suitable quality control method for O. japonicus.

Keywords:

• LC–MS
• Ophiopogon japonicus
• steroidal saponins

Acknowledgements

The authors appreciate the financial support of National S&T Major Project (2008ZX09202-006 and 2009ZX09313-036) and the Zhejiang Provincial Natural Science Foundation of China (no. R2080693).