malaria breakthrough

New, greener extraction process may lead to large-scale production of natural malaria ‘wonder drug’.

Chemical engineers at the University of Bath have been working to develop a more efficient way to extract artemisinin from the herb Sweet Wormwood (Artemisia annua) in an effort to provide more effective treatment for the disease.

Originally extracted by Chinese scientists in the 1980s, it was found to be an extremely potent anti-malarial treatment, with most patients showing marked improvement within 24 hours.

Existing extracting techniques, however, rely on technology based on hexane, which is derived from petroleum and is both toxic and potentially explosive.

University of Bath researchers have been working with FSC Development Services Ltd – under commission from the non-profit Medicines for Malaria Venture (MMV) – and the Dutch government to find a better way to allow for large-scale production in a safer and more environmentally friendly way.

In new research published in the Journal of Natural Products, the University of Bath’s Dr Alexei Lapkin outlines three extraction processes that can compete with traditional methods but in a ‘greener’ way.

The researchers  found that the technologies using scCO2, HFC and ILs, all of which are non-flammable solvents, gave faster extraction times and a more complete extraction of the useful substances in the leaf.

These methods will now be demonstrated and tested over the next year by a consortium of European companies and universities.

“Increased production of Artemisia annua is now happening in many countries around the world, but if we are to reduce the costs of the final drugs we need to increase yield through higher yielding varieties and introduce new, more efficient, safer and more environmentally friendly extraction systems,” commented Dr Lapkin.

Source: scenta.co.uk
Date: 13 February 2007