Study On Extraction, Isolation And Purification Of Camellia Saponin From Camellia Oleifera

Saponins are natural surfactants and bio-chemicals, found in many plants, but they are abundant in the seeds and leaves of camellia oleifera, which are widely cultivated in east and south of China. Extracts from camellia oleifera are commonly used as foaming agents. Recently, their pharmacological activities such as antibacterial, antioxidation, anti-inflammatory activities, inhibitory activity on ethanol absorption in rats etc. have been reviewed. The technology of extracting, purification and determination for camellia saponin were studied in this paper.The alcohol is excellent solvent to extract saponin from the seeds of camellia oleifera .In the extraction test, the orthogonal method was used for studying the effect of alcohol concentration, volume, extracting time and temperature. The optimal extracting conditions were as follows:15 times of amount of 65% alcohol, extracted at 60℃ for 1.5 hours . The content of the saponen was 40.04%, the yield was 11.65% as well..The method of SFE-CO₂ extraction was also used to extract the Camelia saponin. In the experiment, the effect of pressure, temperature, flow rate and the concentration were investigated. At the optimized extraction conditions, the content of camellia saponin extracted by SFE-CO₂ was 78.65%, almost 1 time higher than that extracted by ethanol, and the yield was 6.52%.To purify total camellia saponin from seeds of camellia oleifera, the adsorption and desorption behavior of macroporous adsorbent resins named as D101,AB-8,D4020,301R,NKA,Ds401,DA201 were investigated The comparative research on adsorption isotherm, sorption capacity, desorption ratio and sorption kinetics had been done. The results showed that the pore size and surface area of these macroporous adsorbent resins were key to the adsorption and desorption capacity. At the condition of pH 5.5～6.5, flow rate 1BV/h, the D4020 type of macroporous adsorbent resin showed the better comprehensive property and could be used to separate and purify the total camellia saponin from seeds of camellia oleifera. The content of camellia saponin unpurified was 1 time lower than the one purified by D4020 macroporous adsorbent at the following technological condition: 0.2% NaOH ,20% and 60% ethanol as eluting reagent, eluting velocity 1BV/h. After UV scanning and HPLC analyzying, the results also showed that D4020 macroporous adsobent resin could well separate camellia saponin under the conditions listed above, with a total camellia saponin recovery rate of over 75%.At last the total saponin obtained from the seeds of camellia oleifera, wassubjected to macroporous adsorbent resins D4020 to remove the sugar and flavone components. The ethanol-eluted fraction was separated by normal-phase silica gel column chromatography and sephadex G10 to give the saponin A. After characteristic colour reacting, UV scanning and IR analyse, the saponin A was identified as a kind of tripenent saponin.