Biphasic alcoholysis coupled with high-speed countercurrent chromatography for high performance on separating phorbol from Croton tiglium Linn extracts.

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Phorbol is a tetracyclic diterpenoid found inEuphorbia tirucalli,Croton tiglium, andRehmannia glutinosa, and is nuclear of various phorbol esters. The rapid obtaining of phorbol with high purity highly contributes to its application, such as synthesizing phorbol esters with designable side chains and particular therapeutic efficacy. This study introduced a biphasic alcoholysis method for obtaining phorbol from croton oil by using polarity imparity organic solvents in both phases and established a high-speed countercurrent chromatography method for simultaneous separation and purification of phorbol. The optimized operation conditions of biphasic alcoholysis were a reaction time of 91min, a temperature of 14°C, and a croton oil-methanol ratio of 1:30 (g:ml). The phorbol during the biphasic alcoholysis was 3.2-fold higher in content than that obtained in conventional monophasic alcoholysis. The optimized high-speed countercurrent chromatography method was using the ethyl acetate/n-butyl alcohol/water at 4.7:0.3:5 (v:v:v) with Na2 SO4 at 0.36g/10ml as the solvent system, using the mobile phase flow rate of 2ml/min, the revolution of 800r/min, under which the retention of the stationary phase was achieved at 72.83%. The crystallized phorbol following high-speed countercurrent chromatography was obtained as high purity of 94%.