Simultaneous quantification of caffeoyl esters and flavonoids in wild and cultivated cardoon leaves

Cynara cardunculus is a diploid (2n = 2x = 34) species, native to the Mediterranean basin, which belongs to the family of Asteraceae. It includes globe artichoke, cultivated cardoon, as well as their progenitor wild cardoon. The species is a source of biophenols and its leaf extracts have been widely used in herbal medicine as hepatoprotectors and choleretics since ancient times. Globe artichoke leaves have been found to be rich in compounds originating from the metabolism of phenylpropanoids however, to our knowledge, the leaf polyphenolic composition of the two other forms within the species, cultivated and wild cardoon, have not yet been properly investigated. Two main classes of polyphenols have been detected by HPLC/DAD and HPLC/MS analyses: caffeoyl esters and flavonoids. The compounds which are the result of esterification of caffeoylquinic acid moiety with succinic acid, previously detected in other members of the Asteraceae family, were detected in cardoon leaves for the first time.