Indian Journal of Agricultural Biochemistry

Phytoconstituents are considered as functional food components used widely in pharmaceutical industries for the preparation of medicines/drugs. Many plants are traditionally used in the cure of disorders and to improve health. Some of them are frequently used as an ingredient in food preparation. Some of the fresh plants are not available in all regions. Therefore, they are used there in dry form or extract. Extraction capacity of the selected component varies with the solvent and with plant to plant. Even though methanol extract is reported for higher extraction capacity, present study was made to know the effect of cold extraction method on extraction of various phytoconstituents. Solvents namely ethanol, methanol, acetone, ethyl acetate and hexane were used for extraction of the selected three medicinal plants namely Azadirachta indica, Murraya Koenigii and Andrographis Paniculata. Medicinal plants were analysed for their phenol content, flavonoids, tannin and saponins. Result of our study indicated varying amount of cold extraction capacity of solvents namely phenol, flavonoids, tannin and saponins. Total phenol from A. indica plant was found to be extracted maximum with ethanol (16.26μg/g) whereas M. koenigii leaves extracted maximum with acetone (13.92μg/g) and A. paniculata plant was best extracted with methanol (3.5 μg/g). Flavonoids was better extracted with hexane (93.43μg/100g) from A. indica leaves, ethyl acetate solvent found best for the extraction of M. koenigii leaves (141.31μg/100g) and methanol (132.24μg/100g) was found best solvent for A. paniculata leaves. Tannin was better extracted from A. indica, A. paniculata and M. koenigii leaves by methanol (0.52μg/100g.1.10μg/100g, 0.30μg/100g respectively). Extraction of saponin from A. indica leaves was found maximum with ethanol (6.022μg/100mg) whereas methanol was found better for A. paniculata (11.05μg/100mg) and M. koenigii leaves (4.98μg/100mg).