Competitive cocrystallization and its application in the separation of flavonoids.

ABSTRACT: Recently, cocrystallization has been widely employed to tailor physicochemical properties of drugs in the pharmaceutical field. In this study, cocrystallization was applied to separate natural compounds with similar structures. Three flavonoids [baicalein (BAI), quercetin (QUE) and myricetin (MYR)] were used as model compounds. The coformer caffeine (CAF) could form cocrystals with all three flavonoids, namely BAI-CAF (cocrystal 1), QUE-CAF (cocrystal 2) and MYR-CAF (cocrystal 3). After adding CAF to methanol solution containing MYR and QUE (or QUE and BAI), cocrystal 3 (or cocrystal 2) preferentially formed rather than cocrystal 2 (or cocrystal 1), indicating that flavonoid separation could be achieved by competitive cocrystallization. After co-mixing the slurry of two flavonoids with CAF followed by centrifugation, the resolution ratio that could be achieved was 70-80% with purity >90%. Among the three cocrystals, cocrystal 3 showed the lowest formation constant with a negative Gibbs free energy of nucleation and the highest energy gap. Hirshfeld surface analysis and density of states analysis found that cocrystal 3 had the highest strong interaction contribution and the closest electronic density, respectively, followed by cocrystal 2 and cocrystal 1, suggesting CAF could competitively form a cocrystal with MYR much more easily than QUE and BAI. Cocrystallization is a promising approach for green and effective separation of natural products with similar chemical structures.

SUBMITTER: Xia Y 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC7924225 | biostudies-literature | 2021 Mar

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature