Development of High Performance Liquid Chromatography Tandem Mass Spectrometry Method for Quantitative Analysis of Bacopaside-I in Rat Urine and Feces Samples

Bacopaside I (C46H74O20S) is one of active components isolated from Bacopa monnieri (L.) Wettst. (Brahmi), which has been used as an Ayurvedic medicine plant for centuries [1]. It has been reported that Brahmi has potential therapeutic effect in treatment and prevention of neurological diseases and improvement of cognitive processes [2,3]. Memory enhancing effect of Brahmi has been established through animal experiments and in healthy volunteers. The damarane triterpenoid saponin, Bacopaside I is a major active compounds in Brahmi. HPLC method [4] has been established and used to determine the bacopaside I and other active components in the plant extracts as well as biological samples [3]. 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 LC-MS/MS method, aiming for pharmacokinetic study of bacopasides I.