ABSTRACT
In order to provide new information on polysaccharide in Dendrobium officinale flowers,the monosaccharide composition and relative molecular mass distribution of 11 families of flowers were investigated and analyzed by high performance gel filtration chromatography (HPGFC) and pre-column derivatization ultra performance liquid chromatography (UPLC) in this study. Then cluster analysis was carried out for the monosaccharide peak areas by utilizing SPSS 19.0 software. The results showed that the polysaccharides of all the above 11 hybrid families of D. officinale flower were separated into three fractions (DOP-1, DOP-2 and DOP-3) with the average relative molecular mass of 5.53×105, 3.49×105 and 2.12×105. The polysaccharides in 11 different families were mainly composed of glucose, mannose, galactose, galacturonic acid and arabinose; mannose had the highest proportion among them, with mannose/glucose ratio of 0.302-3.335. Additionally, the relative contents of various monosaccharides in different families varied. 11 families of D. officinale flower could be classified into four categories according to their monosaccharide components and relative contents. In this study, the relative molecular mass distribution and monosaccharide composition of polysaccharides in D. officinale flowers were defined, which can provide foundations for its resource utilization．.