生物堿為麻黃中的主要活性兼毒性成分，以3對互為光學(xué)非對映異構(gòu)體的苯異丙胺類生物堿形式存在，這些生物堿不僅對與對之間的藥理作用存在顯著差異，而且互為非對映異構(gòu)體的一對生物堿之間作用也不同。此外，通過合成途徑獲得的幾種麻黃生物堿，總是摻雜少量的相應(yīng)對映體，這些對映體由于失去活性而以雜質(zhì)的形式存在。因此，為有效合理地控制麻黃及麻黃制劑的質(zhì)量，應(yīng)對所存在的異構(gòu)體分別進行測定。近幾年，麻黃生物堿的手性分析成為研究的熱點。將近年來麻黃生物堿手性分析的色譜方法進行綜述，主要包括高效液相色譜法、氣相色譜法、毛細(xì)管電泳法，并對各方法的優(yōu)劣進行討論。

Ephedra alkaloids, the active and toxic components in Ephedra Herba, are known to naturally exist in the form of three pairs of optically diastereoisomeric amphetamines. These alkoloids show not only the remarkable different pharmacological actiona among pairs, but also the different functions between a pair of diastereoisomer. In addition, the synthetic products of these several alkoloids always intermingles with a small quantity of enantiomers, which are regarded as impurities due to their inactivity. In order to reasonably control the quality of Ephedra sinica and its preparations, and ephedrine alkaloids products, it is necessary to assay diverse isomers including diastereoisomers and enantiomers being in samples. In recent years, the chiral analysis of ephedrine alkaloids become a hotspot. The recent review provides an overview of various chromatographic methods for the chiral analysis of the ephedrine alkaloids. Emphasis will be laid on the analytical methods of HPLC, GC, and CE, and the advantages and limitations of these methods are discussed as well.