Evaluating the quality consistency of antiviral oral liquid by high-performance liquid chromatography five-wavelength matched average fusion fingerprint combined with electrochemical fingerprint and ultraviolet spectral quantum fingerprint

The antiviral oral liquid (AOL) was an antiviral drug currently in clinical trials against coronavirus disease 2019. This study aimed to improve its quality consistency evaluation method using fingerprint techniques from several aspects. First, the five-wavelength matched average fusion fingerprint (FMAFFP) for HPLC, electrochemical fingerprint (ECFP), and ultraviolet spectral quantum fingerprint (UVFP) was established for 22 samples, respectively. Their quality was then assessed using the average linear quantitative fingerprint method, and 22 samples were classified into eight quality grades. OPLS and PCA were then used further to explore the characteristic parameters of these three fingerprints. Five compounds were quantified simultaneously for the first time, and then the relationship between the average linear quantitative similarity (P(L)) and the sum of the five quantitative components (P(5c)) was investigated. A linear correlation (r ≥ 0.9735) between P(L) and P(5c) suggested that P(L) may be used to predict chemical content. Finally, to investigate the antioxidant potential of the AOL, correlation analyses were performed for FMAFFP peaks-P(EC) and UVFP peaks-P(EC), respectively, where the P(EC) value was defined as the quantitative similarity of ECFP. The Pearson correlation coefficient and gray correlation analysis were consistent, allowing us to initially explore the antioxidant capacity of the unidentified components of the samples. This study researched AOL using multidimensional fingerprints to provide a comprehensive and reliable method for quality consistency control of herbal compound preparations.