Experimental plant material preparation

What conditions contributed to the change in chemists classification and then-grouping together of simplicia and chemical preparations, which had been clearly distinguished from each other before 1750 One reason for the transformation in the chemists way of classifying plant materials was the accumulation of experimental experience. 

The experimental techniques are mainly based on the injection of small (peaks) or large pulses (breakthrough curves) and analysis of the obtained chromatogram. Although the presented approach tries to limit the impact of measurement errors, experimental conditions and, especially, the material (adsorbent, eluent) used should be the same or at least comparable to the envisaged preparative application to ensure reliable results. The effects of plant peripherals should be kept low. Another aspect that deserves care is the calibration of the detectors. 

Bucquet s detailed experimental histories of materials regarded as compound proximate principles of plants demonstrate impressively the diverse provenance of these substances, either firom chemical experiments in the chemical laboratory or from the world of trade and commerce. Many of his specific varieties of proximate principles of plants were imported commodities also described in the contemporary pharmacopoeias. For example, the class of extractive parts of plants (see figure 13.7) assembled various chemical extracts separated from plants in the laboratory by decoction and subsequent evaporation as well as juices prepared on a large scale in the trade, such as the juice of Hypocistis, juice of Acasia, and opium. Bucquet described not only the way to obtain the latter three pharmaceutical simplicia from... 

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