Chromatographic fingerprinting with diode array detection for screening regulated plants with potency enhancement...

Area of Science:

• Food Science
• Analytical Chemistry
• Pharmacognosy

Background:

• Plant-based food supplements present analytical challenges due to complex compositions.
• Conventional methods struggle with overlapping signals from multiple plant species.

Purpose of the Study:

• To develop and validate a novel analytical approach for identifying regulated plant materials in complex supplements.
• To assess the prevalence of herbal adulteration in potency-enhancement products from illicit sources.

Main Methods:

• Integrated chromatographic fingerprinting with chemometric analysis.
• Employed multi-wavelength detection for improved signal resolution.
• Developed binary classification models for presence/absence detection of target plant materials.
• Validated models using cross-validation and external test sets.

Main Results:

• The novel approach demonstrated high performance in identifying regulated plant materials.
• A market study of 25 illicit potency-enhancement supplements revealed significant herbal adulteration.
• Undeclared and potentially harmful plant materials were detected.

Conclusions:

• The integrated chromatographic and chemometric method is effective for analyzing complex plant-based supplements.
• Urgent need for systematic screening and stricter regulations for herbal supplements.
• Findings highlight risks associated with unregulated potency-enhancement products.