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. 2018 Jul 3;5(3):70.
doi: 10.3390/medicines5030070.

Optimisation of the Microwave-Assisted Ethanol Extraction of Saponins from Gac (Momordica cochinchinensis Spreng.) Seeds

Anh V Le  1   2 , Sophie E Parks  3   4 , Minh H Nguyen  5   6 , Paul D Roach  7
Affiliations

Optimisation of the Microwave-Assisted Ethanol Extraction of Saponins from Gac (Momordica cochinchinensis Spreng.) Seeds

Anh V Le et al. Medicines (Basel). .

Abstract

Background: Gac (Momordica cochinchinensis Spreng.) seeds contain saponins that are reportedly medicinal. It was hypothesised that the extraction of saponins from powdered Gac seed kernels could be optimised using microwave-assisted extraction (MAE) with ethanol as the extraction solvent. The aim was to determine an appropriate ethanol concentration, ratio of solvent to seed powder and microwave power and time for extraction. Whether or not defatting the Gac seed powder had an impact on the extraction of saponins, was also determined.

Results: A four-fold higher total saponin content (TSC) was obtained in extracts from full-fat Gac seed kernel powder than from defatted powder (100 vs. 26 mg aescin equivalents (AE) per gram of Gac seeds). The optimal parameters for the extraction of saponins were a ratio of 30 mL of 100% absolute ethanol per g of full-fat Gac seed kernel powder with the microwave set at 360 W for three irradiation cycles of 10 s power ON and 15 s power OFF per cycle.

Conclusions: Gac seed saponins could be efficiently extracted using MAE. Full-fat powder of the seed kernels is recommended to be used for a better yield of saponins. The optimised MAE conditions are recommended for the extraction of enriched saponins from Gac seeds for potential application in the nutraceutical and pharmaceutical industries.

Keywords: Gac seeds; Momordica cochinchinensis; microwave-assisted extraction; optimization; saponins.

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Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare no conflict of interest.

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
Experimental design for optimisation of saponin yield from Gac seeds.
Figure 2
Figure 2
Effect of the ethanol concentration, in the extraction solvent used for microwave-assisted extraction (MAE), on the measured total saponin content (TSC) of the full-fat and defatted Gac seed kernel powders. The values are the means of three replicates for each extraction and columns not sharing the same superscript letter are significantly different at p < 0.05.
Figure 3
Figure 3
Effect of the ethanol to powder ratio on the TSC of the full-fat Gac seed kernel powder measured using MAE. The values are the means of three replicates for each extraction and columns not sharing the same superscript letter are significantly different at p < 0.05.
Figure 4
Figure 4
Effect of microwave power and irradiation time (cycles) on the TSC of the full-fat Gac seed kernel powder measured using MAE. The values are the means of three replicates for each extraction and columns not sharing the same superscript letter are significantly different at p < 0.05.
Figure 5
Figure 5
Correlation between the TSC and the temperature of the extract at the end of various MAE treatments. The black dots: TSC at different temperature of the extracts.
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