A sensitive and selective UPLC-MS/MS method for simultaneous determination of 10 alkaloids from Rhizoma Menispermi in rat plasma and its application to a pharmacokinetic study.

A sensitive and selective liquid chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry method has been developed and validated for simultaneous quantitation of 10 alkaloids (dauricine, daurisoline, N-desmethyldauricine, dauricicoline, dauriporphinoline, bianfugecine, dauricoside, stepholidine, acutumine and acutumidine) from Rhizoma Menispermi in rat plasma. After addition of internal standard (verapamil), plasma samples were pretreated by a single-step protein precipitation with acetonitrile. Chromatographic separation was performed on a Waters BEH C18 column with gradient elution using a mobile phase composed of acetonitrile and water (containing 0.1% formic acid) at a flow rate of 0.3 mL/min. The analytes were detected without interference in the multiple reaction monitoring (MRM) mode with positive electrospray ionization. The validated method exhibited good linearity over a wide concentration range (r≥0.9914), and the lower limits of quantification were 0.01-5.0 ng/mL for all the analytes. The intra-day and inter-day precisions (RSD) at three different levels were both less than 13.4% and the accuracies (RE) ranged from -12.8% to 13.5%. The mean extraction recoveries of analytes and IS from rat plasma were all more than 77%. The validated method was successfully applied to a comparative pharmacokinetic study of 10 alkaloids in rat plasma after oral administration of Rhizoma Menispermi extract.