Background
In recent years, ginseng products are widely used in various fields. More and more people pay attention to the extraction methods and quality evaluation of ginseng. At present, China, the United States, Europe, Japan and Korea have the quality standards and content determination methods of ginseng. However, due to the different treatment methods adopted before the determination of ginseng samples, the content limits of the index components, such as ginsenoside Rb1, Rg1 and Re are also different. There have been research analyzed the similarities and differences of ginseng content detection methods in pharmacopoeias of different countries, but the comparison of the effects of different methods on ginsenoside content and structural transformation has not been reported.
Methods
In this paper, ginsenosides in ginseng were extracted according to four national Pharmacopoeia, and analyzed quantitatively and qualitatively by UPLC-Q-Exactive-MS and HPLC-UV. Finally, a simple and feasible extraction method was optimized by response surface method.
Results
Twelve kinds of ginsenosides in ginseng were quantitatively analyzed by using the methods of four national pharmacopoeia. Among them, the contents of Rg1, Re and Rd were high, and they were the highest by using unheated J/KP (Japan/Korea Pharmacopoeia) method. Ten kinds of ginsenosides were determined by heated CP (China Pharmacopoeia), USP (the United States Pharmacopoeia) and EP (European Pharmacopoeia) method, and seven kinds of ginsenosides were determined by unheated J/KP method. In the following UPLC-Q-Exactive-MS study, 34, 36, 21 and 19 ginsenosides were identified by CP, USP, EP and J/KP method, respectively. In the optimization of ginsenoside extraction process, an efficient extraction method was selected from the solvent, extraction time, solid-liquid ratio and other factors. In conclusion, through the qualitative and quantitative comparison of CP, USP and EP samples after heating, it can be seen that ginsenoside heating will increase the content of rare saponins, and the heating time is directly proportional to the content of rare saponins.
Conclusion
The pretreatment method has a significant effect on the content determination of ginseng. The analysis of the preparation method and process optimization of the four Pharmacopoeia can provide important reference for the revision of ginseng standard.