Extraction of Active Biologic Compounds
The four solvents used for extraction were methanol
(80%), ethanol (96%), isopropanol (100%) and ethanol
(60%). The general process of maceration on a small
scale involved placing suitably crushed plant material, or
a moderately coarse powder made from it, in a closed
vessel and adding the selected solvent to allow the solvent
sufficient time to penetrate the cell wall to solubilize
the constituents within the cells and for the
resulting solution to penetrate the cell wall outwards. As
the system is static, except for the occasional shaking,
the process of extraction works by molecular diffusion,
which is very slow. A closed vessel is used to prevent
evaporation of the solvent during the extraction period,
and thus avoids batch-to-batch variation.