Abstract
Rationale: Sanguinarine (SAN), as the main active component of a
traditional Chinese veterinary medicine, have been widely used in animal
husbandry and breeding industry. However, the metabolites of SA are
still uncertain. Therefore, This research aimed to investigate the
metabolites of SA based on rats in vivo. Methods: Blood, feces and urine
of rats were collected after oral administration of 40 mg/kg SAN.
Ultra-high performance liquid chromatography coupled to quadrupole
time-of-flight mass spectrometry (UPLC-Q-TOF-MS/MS) was employed to
identify the metabolites of SAN. The elemental composition of
sanguinarine metabolites was inferred by analyzing their exact molecular
weight, and the metabolites’ structure were predicted based on their
fragment ions and cleavage pathways. Results: A total of 12 metabolites
were identified, including three metabolites in plasma, four in urine
and nine in feces. Accord to the possible metabolic pathways deduced in
this study, SAN was mainly metabolized by reduction, oxidation,
demethylation, hydroxylation and glucuronidation. Conclusions: The
present research have summarized the metabolism of SAN in rats, which is
helpful to further study on metabolic mechanism of SAN in vivo and in
vitro.