Development and Validation of Liquid Chromatography-Time of Flight Method of Bacopaside-I and Metabolites for Pharmacokinetic Study

Bacopa monnieri (L.) Wettst. (Brahmi) is an Ayurvedic medicine plant used for centuries as a memory enhancer. There have been several studies on biological effects of this plant for a therapeutic potential in treatment and prevention of neurological diseases and improvement of cognitive processes. Bacopaside I (C46H74O20S), a dammarane-type triterpenoid saponin, is one of the main active components of the plant and, therefore, it has been produced and used in biological and therapeutic studies. Various analytical method such as HPTLC, ELISA and HPLC methods were used to determine bacopasides I and other active components in the plant extracts as well as biological samples. However, so far LC/MS method for quantitative analysis of Bacopaside I in biological samples has not been reported. We report for the first time the development and validation of a high sensitivity LC-MS (TOF) method, aiming for pharmacokinetic study of bacopasides I and identification of its metabolites produced in vitro and in vivo.