An improved highly sensitive method to determine low oxyresveratrol concentrations in rat plasma and its pharmacokinetic application

ABSTRACT Existing methods to determine oxyresveratrol, a trans‐polyphenolic stilbene, lack selectivity, require large plasma sample volumes or have time‐consuming sample preparation and chromatographic isolation. Here an improved highly sensitive liquid chromatography–tandem mass spectrometry method was developed to determine low oxyresveratrol concentrations in rat plasma. The plasma samples were prepared by liquid–liquid extraction with acetoacetate. The analytes were separated on Venusil hydrophilic interaction chromatography (HILIC) column (2.1 × 50 mm, 5.0 µm) guarded by a HILIC column (4 × 3.0 mm, 5.0 µm). The mobile phase consisted of acetonitrile–water (containing 1 mmol/L ammonium formate) at gradient elution mode with a flow rate of 0.3 mL/min. Resveratrol was used as the internal standard. An electrospray ionization source was applied and operated in the negative multiple reaction monitoring (MRM) mode. Oxyresveratrol and resveratrol were detected on MRM by the transitions from the precursor to the product ion (m/z 243.1 → 175.1 and 227.1 → 143.0). The total running time was 5 min and the retention times of oxyresveratrol and resveratrol were 1.97 and 1.82 min. Chromatograms showed no endogenous interfering peaks with blank samples. The linear calibration curve was obtained over the concentration range of 1–500 ng/mL. The injection volume was 10 μL and the limit of quantification was 1 ng/mL. The extraction recovery varied from 78.2 to 84.3% for low, medium and high quality control samples. At the same time, the intra‐ and inter‐day relative standard deviations were