Introduction: Bambusa tuldoides Munro, a bamboo species, is used as a health food, dietary supplement and folk medicine in China, and produces lignans that can be used to supplement other natural sources.
Objective: To simultaneously separate eight stereoisomers of a particular type of oxyneolignan by chiral chromatography.
Methods: Ninety-five per cent ethanol extracts of B. tuldoides Munro were analysed using HPLC/UV with a chiral column. The structures and configurations of isolated compounds were elucidated using NMR and circular dichroism (CD).
Results: Four diastereoisomers were characterised and given the names oxyneolignans A, B, C and D. Furthermore, each oxyneolignan occurred as a pair of enantiomers. The oxyneolignans A-D consisted of the erythro-diastereoisomer of oxyneolignan at C7 and C8.
Conclusion: The chiral chromatography combined with the analysis techniques of NMR and CD reported here were reliable methods for discovering and separating the enantiomers.
Keywords: NMR; bamboo; circular dichroism; enantiomers; oxyneolignan.
Copyright © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.