Licorice root (Glycyrrhiza glabra), an herbal Chinese medicine, has shown medicinal uses in therapeutics and cancer prevention. Dibenzoylmethane (DBM), a small �-diketone, has been reported to be a minor constituent of licorice and a known deregulator of human prostate cancer cell cycle. Characterization of the phytochemical profiles of licorice root forms including commercially available DBM will advance our search in identifying novel reagents for prostate cancer therapeutics. Gas chromatography- triple quadrupole-mass spectrometry analysis was used for detecting DBM in licorice root extracts. DBM and all licorice forms exhibited a component at a retention time of 14.5 minutes. The major fragment ions detected were m/z 77, 105, 147, 223 and 224 at the identified retention time. Selected reaction monitoring (SRM) confirmed DBM as a minor constituent of G. glabra. This study provides a GC-MS/SRM method which helps in the identification of small trace compounds and minor components in complex biological matrices.

Identification of licorice root components for prostate cancer therapeutics using triple quadrupole GC-MS

245th National Meeting (2013)

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