Natural solvents: new trends for biocompounds extraction from medicinal plants

BOITEUX J.; FERNÁNDEZ M.A; SILVA M.F.; ESPINO M.B.; GOMEZ, FEDERICO J.V.

Mendoza

Simposio; 24th Latin-American Symposium on Biotechnology, Biomedical, Biopharmaceutical, and Industrial Applications of Capillary Electrophoresis and Microchip Technology; 2018

The concept of sustainable development has changed the way of thinking processes and methods. It is essential for analytical chemists to consider how sample preparation can integrate the basic concepts of Green Chemistry. In analytical approaches, extraction is a key step since the main techniques use high volumes of organic solvents with low biodegradability, high cost and high environmental impact. In this sense, the replacement of traditional organic solvents is of utmost importance. Natural Deep Eutectic Solvents (NADES) are presented as a green alternative. These sustainable solvents are constituted by a mixture of compounds naturally presented in the cell metabolism such as sugars, organic acids, urea and choline chloride. Throughout history, medicinal plants have been successfully explored for their properties being an interesting alternative to synthetic drugs. Traditionally, the extraction of plant bio-compounds is carried out with solvents such as chloroform, methanol, ethanol, hexane, diethyl ether and water. In the present work, an extraction procedure mediated by a NADES composed of lactic acid-glucose-water (LGH, 5:1:1) was applied for the recovery of phenolic compounds from Thymus vulgaris and Origanum vulgare. A chromatographic procedure for the analysis of representative phenolic compounds in the bioextracts was developed. Tyrosol, caffeic and rosmarinic acids were the phenols detected for O.vulgare while naringenin, apigenin, caffeic and rosmarinic acids were determined in T. vulgaris. Also, total phenolic content and antioxidant activity were explored. Finally, the performance of LGH as extracting agent was compared with traditional solvents. The results highlighted that the methodology mediated by NADES not only is in agreement with green principles but also achieves satisfactory extraction yields. The bioextracts showed highly promising features for their use in pharmaceuticals.