Planta Med 2012; 78 - PJ103
DOI: 10.1055/s-0032-1321263

Centrifugal partition chromatography – ECO-friendly method for the multigram purification of aucubin and aucubigenin

D Marković 1, R Grougnet 1, Y Salle de Chou 1, B Deguin 1
  • 1Laboratoire de Pharmacognosie de l'Université Paris Descartes, Sorbonne Paris Cité, UMR/CNRS 8638, Faculté des Sciences Pharmaceutiques et Biologiques, 4, Avenue de l'Observatoire, F-75006, Paris

dedicated to the memory of Pr François Tillequin

Aucubin 1, isolated by Bourquelot and Herissey in 1902, is secondary plant metabolite which can be extracted in large amounts from the fresh aerial parts of Aucuba japonica Thunb.. We have showed that this iridoid serves as an excellent starting chiral material in semisynthetic purposes. In this respect we have been interested to develop efficient and fast method of its purification. Multigram water extract can be directly purified by centrifugal partition chromatography using green solvent system based on water and small amounts of non-halogenated solvents. In addition to aucubin 1, biologically related iridoid aglycone, eucommiol 2 and unstable aucubigenin 3, generated by enzymatic cleavage of 1, were isolated in high-purity.

We acknowledge financial support from the ANR (ANR-09-CP2D-09–01: IRNACHIR-2009).