Romanian Society of Pharmaceutical Sciences
 

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COMPARATIVE EVALUATION OF EXTRACTION TECHNIQUES FOR THE PHENOLIC CONTENT AND ANTIOXIDANT CAPACITY OF VIOLA TRICOLOR L. EXTRACTS

PATRICIA MONICA BOZGA 1, ANA-MARIA VLASE 2, RADU COSMIN BOZGA 1*, IONUȚ VENTER 1, BOBU ADRIAN 4, LAURIAN VLASE 3, FLORIN BĂNICĂ 5, SEBASTIAN NEMETH 1,⁵

¹ Doctoral School of Pharmaceutical Sciences, University of Oradea, 410087, Oradea, Romania
2 Department of Pharmaceutical Botany, Faculty of Pharmacy, Iuliu Hațieganu University of Medicine and Pharmacy, 8 Victor Babeș Street, 400012, Cluj-Napoca, Romania
3 Department of Pharmaceutical Technology and Biopharmacy, Faculty of Pharmacy, Iuliu Hațieganu University of Medicine and Pharmacy, 8 Victor Babeș Street, 400012, Cluj-Napoca, Romania
4 Faculty of Automatic Control and Computers, National University of Science and Technology Politehnica, 060042, Bucharest, Romania
5 Department of Pharmacy, Faculty of Medicine and Pharmacy, University of Oradea, 410073, Oradea, Romania

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Viola tricolor L. is a medicinal plant with a long history of traditional use and is recognized as a valuable source of antioxidant phenolic compounds. This study investigated the influence of the extraction technique on the phenolic composition and antioxidant capacity of extracts obtained from the aerial parts of the plant. Five extraction techniques (maceration, microwave, Soxhlet, extraction assisted by ultrasound, and turbo-extraction) were comparatively evaluated by HPLC-MS, determination of total phenolic and flavonoid content, and antioxidant assessment using the 2,2-diphenyl-1-picrylhydrazyl (DPPH) assay and differential pulse voltammetry. The phenolic profile was dominated by rutin (up to 170 µg/mL), together with quercetin glycosides and phenolic acids. Maceration yielded the highest total phenolic content (1.17 mg GAE/mL) and flavonoid (0.29 mg RE/mL) contents, as well as the greatest antioxidant capacity (4.03 mg and 5.61 mg AAE/mL by DPPH assay and differential pulse voltammetry, respectively), followed by Soxhlet extraction. The strong correlation between the antioxidant assays confirmed the reliability of the analytical evaluation, identifying maceration as the most efficient extraction technique for recovering antioxidant compounds from Viola tricolor L.