International Journal of Food Science Volume 2014 (2014), Article ID 241481, 5 pages http://dx.doi.org/10.1155/2014/241481
Research Article
HPLC-Profiles of Tocopherols, Sugars, and Organic Acids in Three Medicinal Plants Consumed as Infusions
Mountain Research Centre (CIMO), ESA, Polytechnic Institute of Bragança, Campus de Santa Apolónia, Apartado 1172, 5301-855 Bragança, Portugal
Received 11 August 2014; Revised 24 September 2014; Accepted 24 September 2014; Published 7 October 2014
Academic Editor: Jaime Yanez
Copyright © 2014 Custódio Lobo Roriz et al. This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
Abstract
Pterospartum tridentatum (L.) Willk, Gomphrena globosa L., and Cymbopogon citratus (DC.) Stapf are medicinal plants that require a more detailed chemical characterization, given the importance of their consumption as infusions. Therefore, the individual profiles in tocopherols, free sugars, and organic acids were obtained by high performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) coupled to different detectors (fluorescence, refraction index, and photodiode array, resp.). C. citratus revealed the highest content of α-, and total tocopherols, glucose, sucrose, succinic, and ascorbic acids. P. tridentatum presented the highest fructose and total sugars content. Otherwise, G. globosa showed the highest organic acids concentration. As far as we know, this is the first study reporting the mentioned chemical compounds in G. globosa and C. citratus.
