Polyphenolic profiles of selected medicinal herbs

Abstract

The total phenolic contents and contents of main individual phenolics in plant extracts of bilberry, willow gentian, wild raspberry, spearmint and peppermint were determined. The above-ground parts of plants were subjected to the exhaustive extraction with ethanol using Soxhlet apparatus. The total phenolic content for the medicinal herbs, ranged from 2.8 to 15.2 mg GAE/g dm, were as follows: spearmint > peppermint > willow gentian > wild raspberry > bilberry. Using high-performance liquid chromatography, an extremely high content of rosmarinic acid was revealed in peppermint sample (849 mg/100 g dm). The plant of bilberry was characterized by greater amounts of chlorogenic acid, rutin and sinapinic acid (367, 248, and 229 mg/100 g dm, respectively) than the above-ground parts of other analyzed species.