Equality-evaluation of Wakan-yaku (Japanese-Chinese traditional medicines) with liquid chromatography-mass spectrometry (LC-MS) : comparison of constituents of original plants for Chinese traditional medicine 'Dan-shen (Tan-j in)'

摘要

Wakan-yaku (Japanese-Chinese traditional medicines) are natural products and its constituents and/or activities depend on several factors, such as species, timing of collection, producing area, individual, etc. Thus, in order to use a homogeneous Wakan-yaku (Japanese-Chinese traditional medicines), it is necessary to use it with an evaluation on the equality of the constituents and/or activities of them, and the effective method for detecting the qualitative and/or quantitative change of the constituents and/or activities is required. However, almost all methods currently in use are based on the comparison of some representative constituents or activities and thus are not suitable for Wakan-yaku (Japanese-Chinese traditional medicines) which usually have many constituents and activities. On the other hand, application of gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (GC-MS) and liquid chromato-graphy-mass spectrometry (LC-MS) has recently been attempted, due to the possibility of measuring many compounds at once. This review deals with the LC-MS method, applicable to several types of compounds, by taking the case of our comparative study on the seventeen Salvia plants. 和漢薬は天然物であり,その成分や活性は種,採集時期,産地,個体等,種々の要因に依存する。そのため,均質な和漢薬を用いるには,その成分や活性の同等性を評価した上で用いる必要があり,成分含量や活性の変化を検出する有効な方法が必要とされている。しかし従来法の多くは,少数の代表的成分や活性の比較であり,多成分,多活性を有する和漢薬に適した方法ではなかった。一方,多成分の同時測定が可能なことから,ガスクロマトグラフィ連結質量分析計(GC-MS)や液体クロマトグラフィ連結質量分析計(LC-MS)の応用が近年試みられている。本稿では,種々のタイプの化合物に適応容易なLC-MS法について,我々が行なった漢薬"丹参"の基源植物間の比較を例として述べた。