Abstract: In order to investigate the metabolic difference of white quinoa from Yanyuan County, Sichuan Province and Doulan County, Qinghai Province, the non-targeted metabolomics analysis was carried out. The white quinoa from two different areas were compared by GC-MS technique and multivariate statistical analysis. It was shown that there were differences in the metabolites of quinoa from two areas, and a total of 29 significant differential metabolites were detected, including 15 amino acids, 6 organic acids and some alditol, amines, polyphenols and alkaloids. There were 22 up-regulated metabolites, 7 down-regulated in all metabolites, and there were 12 amino acids (glycine, L-valine, glutathione, GABA, etc) and 5 organic acids (orotic acid, trans-cinnamic acid, 2-oxo-glutaric acid, etc.) in the up-regulated metabolites. Through the pathway analysis of MetaboAnalyst, 24 metabolic pathways associated with the up-regulated metabolites were detected, of which 7 pathways had significantly different effects on glutathione metabolism, nitrogen metabolism, alanine, aspartate and glutamate metabolism, aminoacyl-tRNA biosynthesis, phenylalanine metabolism, sulfur metabolism, glycine, serine and threonine metabolism. The effect of glutathione metabolism pathway was the most significant, and this pathway was closely related to the resistance of plants, the main metabolites glycine and glutathione of quinoa from Yanyuan, Sichuan Province were detected with a higher level of expression, which indicated the white quinoa from Yanyuan, Sichuan Province, had a stronger antioxidant capacity than that from Doulan, Qinghai Province, so that the plants had a good resistance to survive in adversity, which provided a theoretical basis for guiding the cultivation of white quinoa in both areas and the study on the mechanism of resistance.

Key words: quinoa, non-targeted metabolomics, GC-MS, metabolic differences, resistance