Isolation and purification of gingerols from ginger by high-speed counter-current chromatography

Abstract

High-speed counter-current chromatography (HSCCC) was successfully used for isolation and purification of 6-gingerol, 6-shogaol, 8-gingerol and10-gingerol from the crude ethanol extract of ginger by a consequently stepwise elution which was performed by eluting with the lower phase of n-hexane-ethyl acetate-methanol-water (5.5:5:5.5:5) first and then eluting with the lower phase of n-hexane-ethyl acetate-methanol-water (7:5:7:5), when the upper phase of n-hexane-ethyl acetate-methanol-water (5.5:5:5.5:5) was used as the stationary phase in the head to tail elution mode. The preparative HSCCC separation was performed on 500 mg of the crude extract yielding pure 6-gingerol (12 mg), 6-shogaol (2 mg), 8-gingerol (4 mg) and 10-gingerol (4 mg) at purities of 92.7, 96.8, 91.2 and 92.3 %, respectively, as determined by high performance liquid chromatography (HPLC). HSCCC is a powerful technique for isolation and separation of chemical composition from ginger.