ABSTRACT
Objective:To establish high performance liquid chromatography （HPLC） fingerprint and multi-component determination for the substance benchmark of Yiweitang， and to evaluate its quality in combination with chemical pattern recognition method. Method:Fifteen batches of substance benchmark of Yiweitang were prepared， the "Chinese medicine chromatographic fingerprint similarity evaluation system" （2012 edition） was used to calculate similarity. Cluster analysis， principal component analysis and orthogonal partial least squares-discriminant analysis were employed to handle the common peaks for evaluating the quality difference among 15 batches of the substance benchmark. The contents of catalpol， verbascoside and methylophiopogonanone A were determined with mobile phase system of acetonitrile-phosphoric acid solution at detection wavelengths of 210 nm and 334 nm. Result:There were 22 common peaks in HPLC fingerprint of the substance benchmark， among them， peaks 1， 9， 12， 14-17， 19 and 20 belonged to Rehmanniae Radix， peaks 3， 4， 6， 7 and 21 belonged to Glehniae Radix， peaks 5 and 22 belonged to Ophiopogonis Radix， peaks 2 and 18 belonged to Polygonati Odorati Rhiaoma， peak 8 was the common peak of Ophiopogonis Radix and Rehmanniae Radix， peak 10 was shared by Ophiopogonis Radix， Polygonati Odorati Rhiaoma<italic> </italic>and<italic> </italic>Rehmanniae Radix， peak 11 was the common peak of these four herbs， and peak 13 was shared by Polygonati Odorati Rhiaoma and Rehmanniae Radix. The similarities between HPLC fingerprints of 15 batches of the substance benchmark and the control fingerprint were all >0.90， the samples could be divided into four categories by three chemical pattern recognition methods. Quantitative analysis showed that the contents of catalpol， verbascoside and methylophiopogonanone A among 15 batches of samples ranged from 0.37% to 1.14%， 0.002% to 0.054% and 0.016% to 0.079%， respectively. Conclusion:The established fingerprint and determination for the substance benchmark of Yiweitang have good separation and high accuracy， which reflect the overall chemical composition characteristics of Yiweitang， and can provide experimental basis for the further development and quality control of the compound preparations of this famous classical formula.