Development of the protocol for purification of artemisinin based on combination of commercial and computationally designed adsorbents

作者：Piletska Elena V^*; Karim Kal; Cutler Malcolm; Piletsky Sergey A

来源：Journal of Separation Science, 2013, 36(2): 400-406.

DOI：10.1002/jssc.201200520

• Artemisinin
• Computationally designed adsorbent
• Malaria
• Purification
• Silica gel

A polymeric adsorbent for extraction of the antimalarial drug artemisinin from Artemisia annua L. was computationally designed. This polymer demonstrated a high capacity for artemisinin (120 mg g(-1)), quantitative recovery (87%) and was found to be an effective material for purification of artemisinin from complex plant matrix. The artemisinin quantification was conducted using an optimised HPLC-MS protocol, which was characterised by high precision and linearity in the concentration range between 0.05 and 2 mu g mL(-1). Optimisation of the purification protocol also involved screening of commercial adsorbents for the removal of waxes and other interfering natural compounds, which inhibit the crystallisation of artemisinin. As a result of a two step-purification protocol crystals of artemisinin were obtained, and artemisinin purity was evaluated as 75%. By performing the second stage of purification twice, the purity of artemisinin can be further improved to 99%. The developed protocol produced high-purity artemisinin using only a few purification steps that makes it suitable for large scale industrial manufacturing process.

• 出版日期2013-1