Curcuminoid’s Content and Fingerprint Analysis for Authentication and Discrimination of Curcuma xanthorrhiza from Curcuma longa by High-Performance Liquid Chromatography-Diode Array Detector

An accurate and reliable method for authentication and discrimination of Curcuma xanthorrhiza (CX) from Curcuma longa (CL) by determining the curcuminoid’s content and analyzing the HPLC fingerprint combined with discriminant analysis (DA) was developed. By using the proposed method, it was found that CL had higher amount of all curcuminoid compounds compared to CX. Therefore, these two closely related species could be authenticated and discriminated by the amount of curcuminoids present in the samples. Authentication and discrimination of the two species were also achieved by comparing their HPLC fingerprint chromatograms using their typical marker peaks. To be more convincing, an aid from DA was also used. Combination of HPLC fingerprint analysis and DA gave excellent result that the two species were separated clearly, including CX samples adulterated with CL. The developed method was successfully used for quality control of the two plants.