Qualitative screening of absorbed indoloquinazoline alkaloids and their metabolites in rat plasma after the oral administration of Wu-Zhu-Yu decoction by high-resolution mass spectrometry with multiple data mining algorithms

A rapid and sensitive liquid chromatography with high‐resolution mass spectrometry method with multiple data processing algorithms was developed and applied for the metabolite profiling of evodiamine and its analogous alkaloids in rat plasma after the administration of Wu‐Zhu‐Yu decoction. All samples were purified using hydrophilic‐lipophilic balanced solid‐phase extraction cartridges and analyzed by a Sciex TripleTOF 5600 + mass spectrometer with a 35 min liquid chromatography gradient elution. High‐resolution full‐scan mass spectrometry and information‐dependent acquisition tandem mass spectrometry data were analyzed using multiple data processing approaches. The results indicated that the detected eight prototype alkaloids could be metabolized to 58 metabolites through both phase I and phase II reactions. Oxidation was demonstrated to be the principle metabolic pathway of the parent compounds. The study contributes to the understanding of the absorption and metabolism of the alkaloids in Wu‐Zhu‐Yu decoction and provides a detailed analysis of scientific data.