Study on the chemical composition and in vitro enzyme inhibition of different processed products of Gastrodia elata

Gastrodia elata (GE) has a variety of processed products. However, there are few studies on the comparison of the chemical composition and activity differences of various processed products. In order to further study, the raw materials and different processed products of GE were chemically characterized in detail by UPLC-ESI-Q-TOF-MS/MS, and the content of 7 constituents were determined by HPLC-UV. The activities of different products against α-glucosidase, xanthine oxidase (XO) and acetylcholinesterase (AchE) were evaluated. In total, 170 compounds were identified, primarily including 31 phenolics, 109 parishins, 20 amino acids, 5 nucleotides, and 5 organic acids, and first discovery of 4 potential new compounds. The differences in the chemical composition of GE and its products are mainly in phenolics and parishins. Fresh GE (FGE) extract has the highest content of p-hydroxybenzyl alcohol and p-hydroxybenzaldehyde. The parishins content of dried GE processed products were higher than FGE. And, FGE extract showed the strongest inhibitory activity of α-glucosidase (IC50 was 0.47 mg/mL) and AchE (IC50 was 0.56 mg/mL), and ginger GE extract showed the strongest XO inhibitory activity (IC50 was2.59 mg/mL L), all below corresponding standard inhibitors. And this is the first time that the inhibitory activity of GE against XO has been evaluated.