The aim of this study was to establish a rapid, sensitive, and selective ultra-performance liquid chromatography–tandem mass spectrometry (UPLC–MS/MS) method to quantify the concentrations of licochalcone A and applicate the technique to its pharmacokinetic study. Analytes were separated on an UPLC ethylene bridged hybrid (BEH) C18 column (2.1 mm × 50 mm, 1.7 μm). The mobile phase was consisted of acetontrile and 0.1% formic acid with a flow rate of 0.4 mL/min in a gradient elution mode. Multiple-reaction monitoring (MRM) was carried out in a negative mode for licochalcone A (m/z 337.2 → 119.7) and the internal standard (IS) (m/z 609.0 → 300.9). The linearity of licochalcone A was great from 0.53 to 530 ng/mL. The lower limit of quantification and the lower limit of detection were 0.53 ng/mL and 0.26 ng/mL, respectively. The intra-day precision was less than 14%, and the inter-day precision was no more than 11%. The accuracy was from 91.5% to 113.9%, the recovery was over 90.5%, and the matrix effect was between 84.5% and 89.7%. The results of stability were in an acceptable range. The bioavailability was only 3.3%, exhibiting poor absorption. The developed method was successfully applicable for determining the concentrations of licochalcone A and its pharmacokinetic study.
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A new liquid chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry (LC-MS/MS) method was developed and validated for simultaneous determination of glycyrrhizin, formononetin, glycyrrhetinic acid, liquiritin, isoliquiritigenin, and licochalcone A in licorice. An Eclipse Plus C18 column (I.D. 4.6 × 100 mm, 3.5 μm particle size; Agilent) was used in the analysis. Electrospray ionization (ESI)-tandem interface in the negative mode was performed, and multiple reaction monitoring (MRM) was employed with the precursor multiple reaction monitoring production combination for the determination of six analytes. The average recoveries ranged from 98.30% to 100.13% with relative standard deviations (RSDs) ≤ 1.95%, and limits of detection (LODs) ranged from 2.1 to 3.6 pg. The applicability of this analytical approach was confirmed by the successful analysis of six samples. The results indicated that the established method was validated, sensitive, and reliable for the determination of six analytes in licorice.