Identification of -glycosyl flavones by high performance liquid chromatography electrospray ionization mass spectrometry and quantification of five main -glycosyl flavones in .

is commonly applied in China as a traditional Chinese medicine (TCM), however the quality control of it is incomplete. In this work, we aim to identify and quantify the structures of -glycosyl flavones in . High performance liquid chromatography-diode array detector (HPLC-DAD) and High performance liquid chromatography-electrospray ionization-multiple stage tandem mass spectrometry (HPLC-ESI-MS) methods were combined to identify -glycosyl flavones and determine their contents. Twenty acylated -glycosyl flavones and ten non-acylated -glycosyl flavones were identified for the first time in on systematic MS analysis via HPLC-ESI-MS. The aglycones of all of these compounds were apigenin or chrysoeriol and were acylated with -coumaric, ferulic, 3,4-dimethoxycinnamic or 3,4,5-trimethoxycinnamic acids. Furthermore, the quantification result suggest that two -glycosyl flavones (vicenin-I and vicenin-III) with relative high contents were revealed to be more strongly acylated in . The method is sufficiently precise, accurate, and sensitive for the qualitative and quantitative analysis of -glycosyl flavones, which is expected to establish a standard for quality control and identification in this plant.