Experimental assessment of toxic phytochemicals in Jatropha curcas: oil, cake, bio-diesel and glycerol.

BACKGROUND: Jatropha curcas seed is a rich source of oil; however, it can not be utilised for nutritional purposes due to presence of toxic and anti-nutritive compounds. The main objective of the present study was to quantify the toxic phytochemicals present in Indian J. curcas (oil, cake, bio-diesel and glycerol). RESULTS: The amount of phorbol esters is greater in solvent extracted oil (2.8 g kg⁻¹) than in expeller oil (2.1 g kg⁻¹). Liquid chromatography-mass spectroscopy analysis of the purified compound from an active extract of oil confirmed the presence of phorbol esters. Similarly, the phorbol esters content is greater in solvent extracted cake (1.1 g kg⁻¹) than in cake after being expelled (0.8 g kg⁻¹). The phytate and trypsin inhibitory activity of the cake was found to be 98 g kg⁻¹ and 8347 TIU g⁻¹ of cake, respectively. Identification of curcin was achieved by sodium dodecyl sulfate-polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis and the concentration of curcin was 0.95 g L⁻¹ of crude concentrate obtained from cake. CONCLUSION: Higher amounts of phorbol esters are present in oil than cake but bio-diesel and glycerol are free of phorbol esters. The other anti-nutritional components such as trypsin inhibitors, phytates and curcin are present in cake, so the cake should be detoxified before being used for animal feed.

Estimation of berberine in ayurvedic formulations containing Berberis aristata.

A sensitive, simple, rapid, and efficient high-performance thin-layer chromatographic (HPTLC) method has been developed and validated for the analysis of berberine in marketed Ayurvedic formulations containing Berberis aristata DC for regulatory purposes. Chromatography of methanolic extracts of these formulations was performed on silica gel 60 F254 aluminum-backed TLC plates of 0.2 mm layer thickness. The plate was developed up to 66 mm with the ternary-mobile phase butanol-acetic acid-water (8 + 1 + 1, v/v/v) at 33 +/- 5 degrees C with 5 min of tank saturation. The marker, berberine, was quantified at its maximum absorbance of 350 nm. The limit of detection and limit of quantitation values were found to be 5 and 10 ng/spot. The linear regression analysis data for the calibration plot showed a good linear relationship with correlation coefficient = 0.9994 in the concentration range of 10 to 50 ng/spot for berberine with respect to peak area. The instrumental precision was found to be 0.49% coefficient of variation (CV), and repeatability of the method was 0.73% CV. Recovery values from 98.27 to 99.11% indicate excellent accuracy of the method. The developed HPTLC method is very accurate, precise, and cost-effective, and it has been successfully applied to the assay of marketed formulations containing B. aristata for determination of berberine.