Organic mass spectrometry plays a crucial role in the structure elucidation of those effective substances from traditional Chinese medicine. Secure interpretation of the mass spectra of the effective substances from traditional Chinese medicine requires an adequate understanding of the mechanism of the key fragmentation processes of the mass spectra of the effective substances. The present paper discussed the application of the regular patterns of organic mass spectrometry to the structure elucidation of the effective substances from traditional Chinese medicines. These effective substances from traditional Chinese medicine include osthole from Cnidium monnieri, magnolol and honokiol from Manolia officinalis extracted by supercritical CO₂ method; houttuynium from Houttuynia cordata extracted by hydro-distillation. The presence of the key fragment peak at m/z 229 with higher abundance is the typical characteristic of the mass spectrum of osthol and the presence of the key fragment peak at m/z 169 is the typical characteristic of the mass spectrum of houttuynium. But the presence or absence of the key fragment peak at m/z 247 is the typical characteristic of the mass spectra to differentiate the chemical structures between magnolol and honokiol. We are trying to construct the platform of organic mass spectrometry for effective substances from traditional Chinese medicine based on this study.

Key words: traditional Chinese medicine, effective substance, structure elucidation, organic mass spectrometry