Division of Food, Medicines and Consumer Safety, Section Medicinal Products, Scientific Institute of Public Health (WIV-ISP), J. Wytsmanstraat 14, B-1050 Brussels, Belgium; Research group NatuRA (Natural products and Food - Research and Analysis), Department of Pharmaceutical Sciences, University of Antwerp, Antwerp, Universiteitsplein 1, B-2610 Wilrijk, Belgium.
Research group NatuRA (Natural products and Food - Research and Analysis), Department of Pharmaceutical Sciences, University of Antwerp, Antwerp, Universiteitsplein 1, B-2610 Wilrijk, Belgium.
Talanta. 2017 Mar 1;164:490-502. doi: 10.1016/j.talanta.2016.12.008. Epub 2016 Dec 6.
Erectile dysfunction (ED) is a sexual disorder characterized by the inability to achieve or maintain a sufficiently rigid erection. Despite the availability of non-invasive oral treatment options, many patients turn to herbal alternatives. Furthermore, herbal supplements are increasingly gaining popularity in industrialized countries and, as a consequence, quality control is a highly important issue. Unfortunately, this is not a simple task since plants are often crushed and mixed with other plants, which complicates their identification by usage of classical approaches such as microscopy. The aim of this study was to explore the potential use of chromatographic fingerprinting to identify plants present in herbal preparations intended for the treatment of ED. To achieve this goal, a HPLC-PDA and a HPLC-MS method were developed, using a full factorial experimental design in order to acquire characteristic fingerprints of three plants which are potentially beneficial for treating ED: Epimedium spp., Pausinystalia yohimbe and Tribulus terrestris. The full factorial design demonstrated that for all three plant references a C8 column (250mm×4.6mm; 5µm particle size) is best suited; methanol and an ammonium formate buffer (pH 3) were found to be the best constituents for the mobile phase. The suitability of this strategy was demonstrated by analysing several self-made triturations in three different botanical matrices, which mimic the influential effects that could be expected when analysing herbal supplements. To conclude, this study demonstrates that chromatographic fingerprinting could provide a useful means to identify plants in a complex herbal mixture.
勃起功能障碍（ED）是一种以无法达到或维持足够坚硬的勃起为特征的性功能障碍。尽管有非侵入性的口服治疗选择，但许多患者还是转向草药替代物。此外，草药补充剂在工业化国家越来越受欢迎，因此，质量控制是一个非常重要的问题。不幸的是，这并不是一项简单的任务，因为植物经常被压碎并与其他植物混合，这使得通过使用显微镜等经典方法来识别它们变得复杂。本研究旨在探讨色谱指纹图谱在鉴定用于治疗 ED 的草药制剂中植物的潜在用途。为了实现这一目标，开发了一种 HPLC-PDA 和一种 HPLC-MS 方法，使用完全因子实验设计来获取三种可能有益于治疗 ED 的植物的特征指纹图谱：淫羊藿、育亨宾和蒺藜。完全因子设计表明，对于所有三种植物参考物，C8 柱（250mm×4.6mm；5µm 粒径）是最合适的；甲醇和甲酸铵缓冲液（pH 3）被发现是最佳的流动相成分。通过分析三种不同植物基质中的几个自制细粉，证明了这种策略的适用性，这些基质模拟了在分析草药补充剂时可能预期的有影响的效果。总之，这项研究表明，色谱指纹图谱可以提供一种有用的手段来识别复杂草药混合物中的植物。
