Plants, including cocoa bean, are the main source of metabolites with multiple biological functions. Polyphenol extracts are widely used as a nutraceutical supplement for their well‐known health‐promoting role. In this paper, a preliminary untargeted metabolic screening was carried out by matrix‐assisted laser desorption/ionization (MALDI)‐time of flight (TOF)/TOF on a pool of chocolate samples made by cocoa beans of different geographical areas. Then, a targeted approach was developed for polyphenol quantification by an optimized Liquid chromatography (LC)–tandem mass spectrometry (MS/MS) method multiple reaction monitoring (MRM) ion mode. Detection limit of polyphenol standard ranged between 1 and 25 pg/μl with variation coefficient lower than 15%. External calibration curves were used for quantification of polyphenols in 18 samples. Fifty polyphenols were detected in a single LC–MRM/MS run and quantified by monitoring almost 90 transitions in a 5‐minute run. The polyphenols content of different cocoa beans from several countries was finally compared by principal component analysis (PCA) statistical analysis suggesting that the chocolate made by Ecuador cocoa beans showed the highest level of polyphenols.

中文翻译：

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从非靶向代谢组学到基于多反应监测的不同地理区域巧克力中多酚的定量。

植物，包括可可豆，是具有多种生物学功能的代谢物的主要来源。多酚提取物因其众所周知的促进健康的作用而被广泛用作营养补充剂。在本文中，通过基质辅助激光解吸/电离 (MALDI)-飞行时间 (TOF)/TOF 对由不同地理区域的可可豆制成的巧克力样品池进行了初步的非靶向代谢筛选。然后，通过优化的液相色谱 (LC)-串联质谱 (MS/MS) 方法多反应监测 (MRM) 离子模式开发了一种用于多酚定量的靶向方法。多酚标准品的检出限为1～25 pg/μl，变异系数小于15%。外部校准曲线用于定量 18 个样品中的多酚。在单次 LC-MRM/MS 运行中检测到 50 种多酚，并通过在 5 分钟运行中监测近 90 个离子对进行定量。最后通过主成分分析（PCA）统计分析比较了几个国家不同可可豆的多酚含量，表明厄瓜多尔可可豆制作的巧克力显示出最高水平的多酚。