Diterpenoid Alkaloid Profiling to Distinguish between the Official Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) Fuzi and Adulterant Species Using LC-qToF-MS with Chemometrics.

The lateral roots of , known in Chinese as fuzi, are officially recognized as a materia medica in the and used culinarily to prepare herbal soups. A strategy combining UPLC-qToF-MS analysis of and its intraspecies and interspecies chemometrics study was developed to examine the distribution of marker metabolites. Four diterpenoid alkaloids were recognized to be important markers in fuzi, and another 15 markers were identified to differentiate from adulterant species. The detected fuzi markers, mesaconitine () and hypaconitine (), are known to be the principal toxins in this herb, while fuziline () and benzoylmesaconine () are associated with its medicinal properties. Additional marker compounds have been detected in other species that are useful for identifying adulteration. This study provides a useful resource for detecting traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) adulterants and assisting in the quality control of botanical products in TCM and beyond.