Hplc grade acetonitrile

White sesame seed was purchased from a local supermarket. The five adsorbents of activated carbons used in the present study were as follows: powdered type activated carbon made from peat (AP, F10), powdered type activated carbon made from wood (PW), powdered type activated carbon made from coconut shell (PC) and granular type activated carbon made from coconut shell (GC). F10, PW, PC and GC were purchased from Xin Sen Carbon Co., Ltd. (Nanping, China). AP was obtained from Aladdin Biochemical Technology Co., Ltd. (Shanghai, China). Acetonitrile (HPLC grade) was purchased from Thermo Fisher Scientific (Shanghai, China). Ammonium hydroxide and hydrochloric acid (HPLC grade) were obtained from Kemiou Chemical Reagent Co., Ltd. (Tianjin, China). Methyl alcohol, acetic acid and n-hexane were of HPLC grade, and other chemicals were of analytical reagent grade. Oasis MCX solid-phase extraction cartridge (150 mg, 6 mL) was purchased from Waters (Milford, CT, USA). Additionally, the water used was Wahaha purified water purchased from a local supermarket. The standards AαC, MeAαC, DMIP, Trp-P-1, Trp-P-2, Glu-P-2, MeIQ, MeIQx, IQ, PhIP, 4,8-DiMeIQx, 7,8-DiMeIQx were purchased from Toronto Research Chemicals (Toronto, ON, Canada). Harman, Norharman and 4,7,8-TriMeIQx were purchased from Alta scientific (Tianjin, China).

Melatonin (≥ 99.8%, M5250), used as the standard for liquid chromatography tandem mass spectrometry (LC–MS/MS) detection, was purchased from Sigma Aldrich (St. Louis, MO, USA). Methanol (HPLC grade) was purchased from Thermo Fisher Scientific (Waltham, MA, USA). Acetonitrile (HPLC grade) was purchased from Thermo Fisher Scientific (Waltham, MA, USA). Hydrochloric acid was purchased from Shanghai Aladdin Biochemical Technology Co. (Shanghai, China). Formic acid (HPLC grade) was purchased from Shanghai Aladdin Biochemical Technology Co. (Shanghai, China). 2-Ethyl butyric acid was purchased from Shanghai Aladdin Biochemical Technology Co. (Shanghai, China). Ultrapure water with a resistance of 18.2 MΩ cm − 1 was purified using a Milli-Q system (Millipore, Bedford, USA).

Diosgenin raw material was purchased from Wuhan Yuancheng Science and Technology Development Co., Ltd. (Hubei Province, China). Methanol (HPLC grade) and acetonitrile (HPLC grade) were supplied by Thermo Fisher Scientific Company (Shanghai, China). All analytical grade solvents were purchased from the Sigma Aldrich Reagent Company and were used without further purification.

Methanol HPLC grade was obtained from Panreac Química (Barcelona, Spain). Acetonitrile HPLC grade, formic acid HPLC grade, SYBR safe DNA gel stain, and the primers MatK-1RKIM-f and MatK-3FKIM-r were from Thermo Fisher Scientific (Runcorn, Cheshire, UK). Agarose MB 250 was purchased from Biotools Biotechnological and Medical Laboratories SA (Madrid, Spain). Apigenin-7-glucoside, epigallocatechin, and tiliroside were acquired from Extrasynthese (Genay Cedex, France). Acetoxy acid was from Sigma-Aldrich (St. Louis, MO, USA), and valerenic acid was from Chromadex (Irvine, CA, USA).

Lipopolysaccharide (Escherichia coli, serotype 055:B5) was acquired from Sigma-Aldrich (St. Louis, MO, USA). The ELISA kit for tumor necrosis factor-a (TNF-α) was acquired from Abcam (Cambridge, UK). Dexamethasone (DEX) was purchased from Tianjin KingYork Group Co. Ltd. (Tianjin, China). The Bio-Rad protein assay kit was from Bio-Rad Laboratories (Hemel Hempstead, UK). PBS and acetonitrile (HPLC grade) were purchased from Thermo Fisher Scientific (Waltham, MA, USA). Distilled water was purchased from Watson’s Food & Beverage Co. (Guangzhou, China). Formic acid, analytical grade, was obtained from Beijing Reagent Company (Beijing, China). Qingwen Baidu Decoction was purchased from Beijing Tong Ren Tang. (Beijing, China). Gallic acid, oxypaeoniflorin, paeoniflorin, verbascoside, paeonol and harpagoside were purchased from the National Institutes for Food and Drug Control (Beijing, China). SD male rats were purchased from Vital River Laboratories Co., Ltd. (Beijing, China). The LTQ-Orbitrap mass spectrometer was acquired from Thermo Fisher Scientific. NMR spectra were recorded on a Varian VNMRS 600 MHz (VARIAN, PaloAlto, CA, USA) in DMSO-d₆ solvent using TMS as reference.