Quality evaluation of Moutan Cortex at different growth stages / 中草药

ABSTRACT

Objective: To evaluate the quality of Moutan Cortex at different growth stages. Methods: Metabonomics based on high performance liquid chromatography-quadrupole time-of-flight mass spectrometry (HPLC/Q-TOF-MS) was applied to find the variation of different growth stages. Results: Forty-six metabolites were identified by MS molecular ions and major fragments in conjugation with literature data. The results of principal component analysis showed that the constituent of Moutan Cortex at three growth stages were obviously different. The levels of 13 metabolites were related to the growth time of Moutan Cortex. One-year-old Moutan Cortex contained higher levels of malic acid and gallic acid, suggesting the requirement of sufficient materials for growth and synthesis of complicated secondary metabolites at the first stage. However, in two- and three-years-old Moutan Cortex the levels of some important active compounds such as paeonol and monoterpene glucosides increased. It could be deduced that within three years grouth, good quality of Moutan Cortex was associated with the longer growth time. Conclusion: These results provide the evidence for the quality evaluation of Moutan Cortex at different growth stages, and demonstrate that metabonomics is a powerful approach for the quality evaluation of traditional Chinese malera medica.