Quality Assessment of Crude and Vinegar‐Processed Bupleuri Radix Using High‐Performance Liquid Chromatography Fingerprint and Chemometric Analysis

ABSTRACT Bupleuri Radix (BR), a principal botanical drug in traditional Chinese medicine, is valued for its multifaceted pharmacological activities, including anti‐inflammatory, analgesic, and hepatoprotective properties. Nevertheless, critical challenges persist concerning the ambiguous botanical authentication of crude origins and inconsistent quality control in processed BR materials. In this study, high‐performance liquid chromatography fingerprints were successfully established, and the similarity was 0.814–0.923. Subsequently, through hierarchical cluster analysis and principal component analysis, the samples were initially classified into two origins: Bupleurum chinense DC. and Bupleurum scorzonerifolium Willd. Within each origin group, the specimens were further stratified into two subgroups: crude and vinegar‐processed BR. Orthogonal partial least squares‐discriminant analysis was applied to confirm classification results and obtain the chemical markers. The content determination results showed that Saikosaponin a (SSa) and Saikosaponin d (SSd) in both origins exhibited notable reductions following the vinegar‐processing procedure, while Saikosaponin b 1 (SSb 1 ) and Saikosaponin b 2 (SSb 2 ) demonstrated marked increases. Network pharmacology and molecular docking techniques demonstrated that active molecules have a higher affinity for ALB and CASP3. The methods and results of this study provide a reliable basis for the identification and rational utilization of BR.