High-Speed Countercurrent Chromatography Separation of Compounds from Herb

Researchers from the Chinese Academy of Sciences (Guangdong, China) used high-speed countercurrent chromatography to purify two benzoxazinoid glucosides from Acanthus ilicifolius L. The spiny herb is found in the mangroves of Southeast Asia and reportedly has medicinal properties. They first used n-butanol to extract the compounds from the plant. They then used a two-phase solvent system consisting of ethyl acetate, n-butanol, and 0.5% ammonium hydroxide for the single-step countercurrent chromatography separation of the two compounds. They also developed a two-step second separation process to obtain the compounds with higher purity.