Electrochemical fingerprint profiling for quality assessment of Kadsura coccinea fruit

An electrochemical fingerprinting method was developed for the quality assessment and geographical origin discrimination of Kadsura coccinea fruit. The optimized conditions, using BRBS (pH 5.0) as the electrolyte, a potential range of -0.2 to 1.0 V, and a scan rate of 100 mV/s, yielded reproducible fingerprints with three main oxidation peaks corresponding to phenolic compounds, flavonoids, and lignans. Ethanol was identified as the most effective extraction solvent. The fingerprints exhibited strong correlations (0.8542 to 0.9317) with the contents of key compounds determined by HPLC. Chemometric analysis revealed clear differences among samples from different origins, with accuracies of 96.7%, 96.7%, and 95% for the discrimination of Hubei, Sichuan, and Yunnan samples, respectively. The proposed method demonstrates potential as a rapid, reliable, and cost-effective approach for the quality control and authenticity verification of K. coccinea fruit.