Method development of phenolic acid profiling analysis as tert-butyldimethylsilyl derivative by gas chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry

An efficient gas chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry-based method using tert-butyldimethylsilyl derivative was developed for the simultaneous analysis of 10 phenolic acids. Under optimal conditions, linearity in the range of 2-100 ng/ml exhibited correlation coefficient (r) of >= 0.999. Repeatability showed low relative standard deviation of <16.7%, and accuracy (% relative error) varied from -9.8 to 3.4. New mass spectra data sets of 10 phenolic acids were constructed in multiple reaction monitoring mode. When applied to Orostachys japonica (Maxim.) A. Berger, the 10 phenolic acids of salicylic, 4-hydroxybenzoic, vanillic, m-coumaric, syringic, p-coumaric, protocatechuic, ferulic, gallic, and caffeic acids were positively identified. We believe that the devised method will be found useful for profiling phenolic acids in various plant samples.