HEAD SPACE SOLID-PHASE MICROEXTRACTION FOR THE GC-MS ANALYSIS OF TERPENOIDS IN HERB BASED FORMULATIONS

Head-Space Solid Phase Microextraction (HS-SPME) has been employed for sampling of volatile components and their volatile decomposition prod ucts occurring in herbal medicines and herb extracts with subsequent i njection into a gas chromatographic column. The identification and qua ntification was performed by coupled gas chromatography - mass spectro metry (CC-MS) with classical splitless injection, electron impact ioni zation and a quadrupole mass analyzer. As fast and inexpensive techniq ue for the isolation of organic analytes HS-SPME with CC-MS can be suc cessfully employed for the quality control of herbal medicines and oth er formulations containing herb extracts. Analytical results with sati sfying accuracy and precision are given.