Recently, the team of Xiao Deli and Dramou Pierre from the College of Science, China Pharmaceutical University (CPU) published their latest research results in the Journal of Cleaner Production (IF:11.1): Simultaneous and selective extraction of different polarity Ziwei Lu, a graduate student from the College of Science of our university, was the first author of the article, and Deli Xiao and Associate Professor Dramou Pierre were the co-corresponding authors. The Chinese University of Pharmaceutical Sciences is the sole author of the article.
Traditional Chinese medicine, as a common drug for treating clinical diseases, is often complex and diverse in composition. Traditional extraction methods mostly use organic solvents, which have problems such as poor selectivity, easy decomposition of the extracted active ingredients, easy leaching of a large number of impurities, causing environmental pollution, and even residues in the final product that can cause serious harm to human health. In addition, most of the plant resources contain hydrophilic and hydrophobic active substances with large differences in polarity, and the traditional single-phase organic solvent and low eutectic solvent extraction system cannot extract and separate multiple components at the same time, resulting in low extraction efficiency and waste of resources. Therefore, there is an urgent need to develop a fast, green and highly selective extraction technology to solve the extraction bottleneck of traditional Chinese medicines and to promote the development of new technologies for Chinese medicine extraction.
In order to overcome the above bottlenecks, the team of Xiao Deli and Dramou Pierre constructed a biphasic extraction system based on the hydrophilic and hydrophobic nature of low eutectic solvent (DES). Taking chasteberry as the research object, the biphasic DES system consisting of hydrophobic low-eutectic solvent MIA and hydrophilic low-eutectic solvent CBE was established by adjusting the polarity of solvents in the biphasic system, which realized the simultaneous extraction and separation of oleanolic acid, ursolic acid, flavonoids, and proanthocyanidins in chasteberry with different polarities in one step. Compared with the conventional extraction system with single-phase organic solvents, the biphasic DES system can realize higher extraction efficiency and simultaneous separation of multiple components. Meanwhile, DES has better selectivity and biocompatibility, and the extracts showed stronger antioxidant activity. The biphasic DES system designed in this study provides a theoretical basis for the efficient utilization of Chasteberry, and has application potential in advancing the modernization and industrial application of the extraction process of traditional Chinese medicine.
In addition, the team has published a series of articles in Journal of Environmental Management (IF:8.7) and International Journal of Biological Macromolecules (IF:8.2) since 2024, reporting on the treatment of large-volume wastewater, gallic acid extraction and analysis.
