What are the different solvents used for the extraction of bioactive compounds from the medicinals plants?
Which method/solvent is most commonly used ?
Many are available but depends on the phytochemicals of interest. Methanol, ethanol, ethyl acetate etc.
Dear Aditi,
Read this particular paper Namely "A review of modern sample-preparation techniques for the extraction and analysis of medicinal plants. Anal Bioanal Chem. 2002 May; 373(1-2):23-30"
and
Extraction, Isolation and Characterization of Bioactive Compounds from Plants' Extracts. Afr J Tradit Complement Altern Med. 2011; 8(1): 1–10.
Azwanida NN (2015) A Review on the Extraction Methods Use in Medicinal Plants, Principle, Strength and Limitation. Med Aromat Plants 4: 196. doi:10.4172/2167-0412.1000196
Article Techniques for extraction of bioactive compounds from plant ...
There are so many, most common is methanol. So, you would find Methanolic Extract (ME) in all sorts of papers. This is the starting point, then other solvents are used for finding fractions from this ME. Ethanol, Acetone, water, ethyl acetate, chloroform and many others are used. After this, the subfractions are prepared by using again different solvents depending on the TLC (a chromatography) plate reading. Finally pure compounds are purified by HPLC or other methods. Hope this helps.
Regards
Thank you Nurul Kabir sir for your response. Sir conducting the extraction technique with methanol should be the first test for all herbs, by all I mean specially the one whose phytochemicals aren't known?
A large variety of solvent are used for such purpose. The solvent use depends mainly on the class of secondary metabolites that are present in the plant material. Do you have any specific class of secondary metabolites that you want to isolate or do you want to extract the maximum of secondary metabolites?
they are so many...but commonly start with methanolic extract then further solvent depends on that which type of secondary metabolites you want to isolat.
In addition to above, also consider hexane, propylene glycol, and supercritical CO2. Blends are sometimes useful, e.g. ethanol/water. The choice of solvent depends on the polarity and other physical properties of the molecules of interest and those to be rejected. For example, citrus oils are extracted with polar solvents to selectively remove flavor actives and exclude terpenes. pH can be used to advantage for some molecules. Steam distillation may be preferred to extraction if the molecule of interest is not heat labile.
It depends on the type of métabolite that you want to extract , it can be Methanol,Ethanol , or simply the Water
Before starting your experimentation try to read a review that concern your plant
Different solvents are specifically suitable for given categories of secondary metabolites based on their interactive properties. You could use methanol or 70% ethanol to begin with but have comprehensive knowledge of the categories of bioactive secondary metabolites in the plant of target and decide accordingly
We always made the extraction with metanhol, 5 g de biológica part in vial and full to 100 ml.and save by se en days...
Many are available but depends on the phytochemicals of interest. Methanol, ethanol, ethyl acetate etc.
Thank you Alan Gabelman sir , I would like to know, will the methanol solvent only help to yield maximum phytochemical or will it also help in detection and identification of which class of phytochemical has been extracted ?
Hi Aditi
I think you're talking about two separate issues: the extraction, and the analysis of the extract. I'm not an analytical chemist so I'll leave comment on the latter to others. Or maybe I'm misunderstanding your question?
Alan
- Badges
- Science topic