Identification and Characterization of Homoharringtonine from Cephalotaxus koreana

A novel purification method was developed for producing homoharringtonine from Cephalotaxus koreana, to guarantee high purity and yield. Our simple, efficient procedure for isolating and purifying homoharringtonine from C. koreanabiomass consisted of solvent extraction, synthetic adsorbent treatment, low-pressure chromatography, followed by high performance liquid chromatography (HPLC). The use of active clay treatment and silica gel low-pressure chromatography in the pre-purification process allowed for the rapid, efficient separation of homoharringtonine from interfering compounds and dramatically increased the yield and purity of crude homoharringtonine for high-performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) purification steps compared with alternative processes. Homoharringtonine could be obtained simply with high yield and purity from biomass using this purification method, while minimizing solvent use and the scale and complexity of HPLC operations for homoharringtonine purification. Purified homoharringtonine was identified and characterized.

한국산 개비자나무로부터 새로운 개념의 homoharringtonine 분리 및 정제 공정을 개발하였다. 메탄올을 사용한 4회 반복 추출에 의해 biomass로부터 대부분(>99%)의 homoharringtonine을 회수 할 수 있었다. 흡착 공정에서는 활성 백토(active clay)를 사용하여 추출물에 포함되어 있는 식물유래 타르, 왁스 성분을 효과적으로 제거하였다. Silica gel low-pressure chromatography공정을 통해서 순도 52% 이상의 homoharringtonine을 얻었으며, HPLC 공정을 통해 고순도 및 고수율의 homharringtonine을 정제할 수 있었다. 정제된 homoharringtonine의 분자량 및 구조분석을 수행한 결과 표준물질(Homharringtonine)과 동일 물질임을 확인할 수 있었다.