Separation and Purification of Strychnine from Crude Extract of Strychnos nux-vomica L. by High-Speed Countercurrent Chromatography

Abstract

High-speed countercurrent chromatography (CCC) was applied to the separation of strychnine and brucine from crude extract of Strychnos nux-vomica L. using a two-phase solvent system composed of chloroform/0.07 M sodium phosphate, 0.04 M citric buffer (pH 5.08) (1:1, v/v). Fractionated components were identified with authentic pure compounds on TLC and also analyzed by HPLC, IR and FTMS. The results showed that from 40 g of the seed powder, 48.2 mg of strychnine was purified at 99.9% purity (83.3% recovery) while 18.1 mg of brucine fraction was obtained after rechromatographed by preparative TLC improving the purity to 91.2%.