[Quantitative determination of ginkgolides by liquid chromatography-electrospray mass spectrometry]

This paper reports a method based on liquid chromatography coupled with electrospray mass spectrometry for the analysis of terpenoids in ginkgo laminae.

The analysis was performed on ZORBAX RX-C18 (2.1 mm x 150 mm) column with methanol-water(with gradient) as mobile phase at a flow rate of 0.25 mL x min(-1), and column temperature of 25 degrees C. Analyses were carried out in the selected ion monitoring (SIM) mode.

Ginkgolides (GA, GB and GC) and bilobalide were quantitatively detected by external standardization with linear in the range of 4.04-1.012 x 10(2) ng, with coefficient and relative standard deviations being 0.993 7-0.999 8 and 2.50%-4.73%. LC-ESI-MS shows a greatly increased sensitivity compared with other methods. The detection limit of this method by SIM was 1.47 x 10(-3)-0.320 microg x mL(-1).

This method is specific, reproducible, rapidly and permits quantitative analyses of ginkgolides and bilobalide in different samples with simple pre-purification steps.