OBJECTIVE To develop an ultra-performance liquid chromatography-tandem triple quadrupole mass spectrometry(UPLC-TQ-MS) method for the simultaneous determination of 12 chlorogenic acid and flavonoid components in Chinese herbal medicine Cuscutae Semen, and to analyze quality differences among samples collected from 9 different origins.

METHODS Samples were extracted with 70% ethanol. Analysis was performed using an ACQUITY UPLC BEH C₁₈ column(100 mm×2.1 mm, 1.7 µm) with a gradient elution of 0.1% formic acid in water and 0.1% formic acid in acetonitrile. Quantitative was performed based on peak area.

RESULTS Hyperoside, chlorogenic acid, and astragalin exhibited the highest content levels in Cuscutae Semen. Among them, the sample from Balin Left Banner, Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region had the highest content of hypericin, the sample from Wuyuan County, Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region had the highest content of chlorogenic acid, and the sample from Jiuyuan District, Baotou, Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region had the highest content of astragalin. Various pattern recognition methods could be used for discriminanting of Cuscutae Semen from different origins, with support vector machine(SVM) was the best model for origin tracing. Orthogonal partial least squares discriminant analysis(OPLS-DA) showed that astragalin and tiliaflorin were the key compounds for origin identification.

CONCLUSION This study develops an accurate, efficient and reproducible quantitative method for multi-indicator content and modeling analysis of Cuscutae Semen from major production areas, and provides a reference basis for the quality evaluation, origin tracing, and product development of Cuscutae Semen.