Quantitative analysis of the purgative components of rhubarb and senna.

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Abstract
A study on the estimation of sennosides and derivatives of oxyanthraquinones in rhubarb and senna is described. After extracing a ground crude drug with the mixture of calcium acetate buffer and tetrahydrofuran (THF), the extract was fractionated to aqueous and THF phases. Both fractions were heated with sulfuric acid to hydrolyze the glycosides contained, and the resulting aglycones were extracted with ether. The aqueous fraction containing sennidins and rhein was analyzed by spectrophotometry. The THF fraction containing only oxyanthraquinones was analyzed by densitometry on a thin-layer plate. It was suggested that sennosides were the main purgative principles of rhubarb or senna, and that oxyanthraquinones had little contribution to the activities of crude drugs. The qualities of rhubarbs varied more markedly than those of sennas. It was clarified that the activities of crude drugs in mice correlated closely to the contents of sennosides. One can, therefore, estimate the purgative activity roughly from the contents of sennosides.

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