Liquid chromatography mass spectrometry for the determination of salvianolic acid B, a natural compound from the herb Danshen in rat plasma and application to pharmacokinetic study

A sensitive and specific liquid chromatographic-electrospray ionization mass spectrometric method was developed for quantification of salvianolic acid B in rat plasma with resveratrol as the internal standard. The analytes were separated on a reversed-phase column with acetonitrile (40%) and water (60%) containing 0.75% formic acid as mobile phase at a flow rate of 1 mL/min. Liquid-liquid extraction was adopted for the sample preparation, and the analytes were determined using electro-spray negative ionization mass spectrometry in the selective monitoring mode. The method was validated over the concentration range 0.1-40 mu g/mL. using 0.1 mL. of plasma with coefficients of correlation >0.999. The intra- and inter-day precisions of analysis were <10%, and accuracy ranged from 94 to 101%. This method was successfully applied to a pharmacokinetics of salvianolic acid B in rats. Copyright (C) 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.