Ligustrum Fruit is a crude drug derived from the fruit of Ligustrum lucidum W.T. Aiton or L. japonicum Thunb. (Oleaceae). It has several pharmaceutical activities including hepatoprotection, antioxidation and improvement of bone turnover and therefore, it is used as an ingredient in many crude drug products for nutrition fortification. In preparation for the listing of the drug to Non-JP Crude Drug Standards (Non-JPS), we designed an identification test using TLC and identified the marker spot as nuzhenide based on the spectroscopic data including 1H-, 13C-NMR and MS together with the comparison of TLC, LC-MS and NMR with those of the authentic compound.
The established TLC conditions are as follows: chromatographic support, silica gel; developing solvent, EtOAc/MeOH/H2O (7/2/1); developing length, 7 cm; detection, UV (254 nm) and 1-naphthol-sulphuric acid reagent; Rf value, 0.4 (nuzhenide).
