title: Tissues-based chemical profiling and semi-quantitative analysis of bioactive components in the root of Salvia miltiorrhiza Bunge by using laser microdissection system combined with UPLC-q-TOF-MS.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  The dry root of Salvia miltiorrhiza Bunge (Danshen in Chinese) is an used-widely traditional Chinese herbal medicine with and promising efficacy. This herbal plant has been extensively cultivated in China. Currently, people usually rely on its morphological features to evalaute its pharmaceutical quality. In this study, laser micro-dissection system (LMD) was applied to isolate single fresh tissue of root of S. miltiorrhiza. Under fluorescent microscopic model, five tissues namely cork, cortex, phloem, xylem ray and vessel were well recognized and isolated accurately by LMD, respectively and then the distribution pattern of the major bioactive compounds in various tissues was investigated by ultra-performance liquid chromatography-quadrupole/time of flight-mass spectrometry, which aims to validate the traditional experience on evaluating pharmaceutical quality of Danshen by morphological features.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Total 62 chemical peak signals were captured and 58 compounds including 33 tanshinones, 23 salvianolic acids and 2 others were identified or tentatively characterized in micro-dissection tissues. Further semi-quantitative analysis indicated that the bioactive components such as tanshinones and salvianolic acids were mainly enriched in cork tissue.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  In the present study, analysis of metabolic profile in different tissues of roots of S. miltiorrhiza is reported for the first time. The distribution pattern of major bioactive components could enable medicinal vendors and consumers to relatively determine the pharmaceutical quality of Danshen by morphological features.Graphical abstractTissues-based chemical profiling of Danshen.
authors.affiliation: School of Chinese Medicine, Hong Kong Baptist University, Kowloon, Hong Kong, Special Administrative Region People's Republic of China.
authors.forename: Wenjian
authors.initials: W
authors.lastname: Xie
authors.affiliation: School of Chinese Medicine, Hong Kong Baptist University, Kowloon, Hong Kong, Special Administrative Region People's Republic of China.
authors.forename: Hongjie
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Zhang
authors.affiliation: Hunan Provincial Key Laboratory of Crop Germplasm Innovation and Utilization and National Chinese Medicinal Herbs Hunan Technology Center, Hunan Agricultural University, Changsha, China.
authors.forename: Jianguo
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Zeng
authors.affiliation: School of Chinese Medicine, Hong Kong Baptist University, Kowloon, Hong Kong, Special Administrative Region People's Republic of China.
authors.forename: Hubiao
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Chen
authors.affiliation: School of Chinese Medicine, Hong Kong Baptist University, Kowloon, Hong Kong, Special Administrative Region People's Republic of China.
authors.forename: Zhongzhen
authors.initials: Z
authors.lastname: Zhao
authors.affiliation: School of Chinese Medicine, Hong Kong Baptist University, Kowloon, Hong Kong, Special Administrative Region People's Republic of China.
authors.forename: Zhitao
authors.initials: Z
authors.lastname: Liang
keywords: Pharmaceutical quality evaluation; Salvia miltiorrhiza Bunge; Salvianolic acids; Tanshinones; Tissues-based analysis