posted on 2012-04-04, 00:00authored byYifeng Cao, Huabin Xing, Qiwei Yang, Zongbi Bao, Baogen Su, Yiwen Yang, Qilong Ren
The separation of a compound of interest from its structurally
similar homologues is an important and challenging problem in producing
high-purity natural products, such as the separation of genistein
from other soybean isoflavone aglycone (SIA) homologues. The present
work provided a novel method for separating genistein from its structurally
similar homologues by ionic liquid (IL)-based liquid–liquid
extraction using hydrophobic IL–water or hydrophilic IL/water–ethyl
acetate biphasic systems. Factors that influence the distribution
equilibrium of SIAs, including the structure and concentration of
IL, pH value of the aqueous phase, and temperature, were investigated.
Adequate distribution coefficients and selectivities over 7.0 were
achieved with hydrophilic IL/water–ethyl acetate biphasic system.
Through a laboratory-scale simulation of fractional extraction process
containing four extraction stages and four scrubbing stages, genistein
was separated from the SIA homologues with a purity of 95.3% and a
recovery >90%.