Ginseng’s therapeutic qualities have been known throughout the eastern world for thousands of years. During the past 300 years, knowledge of ginseng’s benefits spread to the west, but insight into its biological activity were slow to follow. Recent studies have shown that this activity is most likely due to a group of 20 steroidal saponins known as ginsenosides. Many of these structures have unique mechanisms of action in the human body, with effects ranging from possible anticarcinogenicity to increased energy and memory uptake. While several studies have focused on identifying ginsenosides, fewer have made it a point to quantify the relative amounts of each, especially within the subsets of North American ginseng, Panax quinquefolius. This study sought to compare the abundance of specific ginsenosides in Appalachian wild and wild-cultivated ginseng with that of commercially cultivated ginseng and ginseng extract pills using liquid chromatography mass spectrometry (LC-MS) and tandem mass spectrometry (MS-MS). The study showed that Appalachian ginsenoside levels were constant regardless of whether the sample was wild or wild-cultivated and that levels generally corresponded to commercially cultivated American ginseng.

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