An Extraction Comparison

Kalveniene, Velziene, Ramanauskiene, Savickas, Ivanauskas, and Brusokas (2007) conducted a study to determine the amount of rutin, quercetin, and other flavonoids in an ethanol extract that is created with St. John’s wort, rosemary leaves, ginger root, lavender flowers, and cinnamon bark.  The ethanol was 70%.

They used high pressure chromatography to identify the flavonoids. The flavonoids identified were chlorogenic acid, caffeic acid, vicenin, orientin, vitexin-4-rhamnoside, vitexin, isovitexin, rutin, hyperoside, apigenin, glucoside, astragalin, quercitrin, luteolin, quercitin, and kaempferol. The largest amounts in the multi-herb extract were hyperoside, quercitin, rutin, and chlorogenic acid.

Flavonoids were not found in the control ginger extract. St. John’s wort had similar results to the combined extract. Ginger had a very small amount of flavonoids. Cinnamon had very small amounts of quercitin, apigenin-7-glycoside, quercetrin, and kaempferol (not enough for medicinal purposes). Lavender had hyperoside, vitexin, rhamnoside, vicenin, rutin, luteolin, apigenin, and apigenin-7-glycoside. Rosemary had caffeic acid, isovitexin, and luteolin.

The ratios for the combined extract and the controls were: St. John’s wort 1:12.5, ginger 1:16.7, cinnamon 1:50, rosemary 1:50, and lavender 1:50.  The extract recipe was 4 parts St. John’s wort, 3 parts ginger, 1 part cinnamon, 1 part rosemary, and 1 part of lavender. They said the crude drug mixture requires 1 part of an herb to 5 parts ethanol for a 1:5 ratio.

These herbs were chosen because they compliment each other in helping with digestive disorders.  They concluded that St. John’s wort was more available than the other herbs as those constituents were the highest concentration in the combined mixture.

My comments on this study are simple.  The recipe they used in this study used more St. John's wort (4 parts) and ginger (3 parts) than the other 3 herbs, 1 part each) so of course the constituents from St. John's wort would be more prevalent. The standard alcohol percentage for cinnamon is between 70-80%. The standard for lavender flowers is 50%. Ginger is 70%. Rosemary leaves and St. John's wort are both 40%.   70% was used across the board which may cause destruction of the constituents.

Have a Great Day!
 
Kalveniene, Z, Velziene, S., Ramanauskiene, K., Savickas, A., Ivanauskas, L., and Brusokas, V. (2007). The Qualitative Analysis Of Ethanol Extracts Of Herbal Raw Materials By Method Of High Pressure Liquid Chromatography. Acta Poloniae Pharmaceutica Drug Research 84(4):327-333.