RESUMO
This study was aimed to establish an HPLC method for the determination of liquiritin, isoliquiritin, liquiritigenin and glycyrrhizic acid in roots and knotty rhizome of Glycyrrhiza uralensis. The analysis was performed on a Diamonsil C18 column (250 mm í 4.6 mm, 5 μm) by using a gradient elution with mobile phase of water, phosphoric acid, acetonitrile at the flow rate of 1.0 mL·min-1. The detection wavelength was 276 nm (0~18 min), 360 nm (18~24 min), 276 nm(24~30 min), and 250 nm (30~65 min). The column temperature was set at 30℃. The results showed that the linear range of iquiritin, isoliquiritin, liquiritigenin, glycyrrhizic acid was 0 . 108 5~1 . 085、0 . 016 8~0 . 168、0 . 0049 4~0 . 049 4、0 . 407~4 . 07μg , respectively . The average recoveries of four constituents were 96.61%~100.89%, with RSD ≤ 0.81%. The contents of four constituents in roots of five batches were 0.513%, 0.072 9%, 0.048 4%, and 1.945%, respectively. Contents of four constituents in knotty rhizome from two batches were 0.456%, 0.063 6%, 0.036 2%, and 1.630%, respectively. It was concluded that there was good linear relationship between the response and concentration. Contents of four constituents in knotty rhizome were basically the same as those in the roots. The knotty rhizome can be used as raw material for the extraction of active components.