In many areas of China Cirsium setosum is used as Cirsium japonicum DC. Although the two herbs have similar appearance and many similar compounds, they are totally different medicinal material, and have different pharmacodynamic actions. The fingerprint spectrum can be a good tool to distinguish the two herbs and control the quality of Cirsium japonicum DC. In this paper, the chemical fingerprint of Cirsium japonicum DC was established using raw materials from 15 origins in China. The chromatographic separations were obtained by a SHIM-PACK VP-ODS column (150 mm×4.6 mm i.d., 5 μm) using gradient elution, and run time of 80 min. The peak of linarin was considered as the control peak. The experimental data were analyzed with the software of Similarity Evaluation System for Chromatographic Fingerprint of Traditional Chinese Medicine (Version 2004A) and the quality control system of both the overall qualitative similarities and the overall quantitative similarities of traditional Chinese medicine chromatographic fingerprints.
Keywords: Cirsium japonicum DC; Fingerprint; High performance liquid chromatography-photodio dearray detector (HPLC-PDA); Linarin.