Simultaneous Separation and Purification of Tea Bioactives from summer Green Tea by Column Chromatography

Abstract

In the present study, feasibility of producing high quality of tea polyphenols, theanine and caffeine from the extract of summer green tea by column chromatography was investigated. Crude extract of summer green tea obtained by hot water extraction was passed through columns of polyamide and NKA-II macroporous resin respectively, resulting in tea polyphenols-enriched fraction (96.27 ± 1.78%), theanine-enriched fraction (99.02 ± 0.43%) and caffeine-enriched fraction (99.25 ± 0.36%). The recovery rates for tea polyphenols, theanine and caffeine were 72.42 ± 1.41%, 66.12 ± 1.66% and 62.07 ± 2.17%, respectively. The separation procedure allowed the production of such products by decreasing impurities and avoiding the use of poisonous organic solvent. The results suggested that it was possible to produce high-quality products of rich-in tea polyphenols, theanine and caffeine by a simple way. From industrial point of view, this novel method has many merits such as high efficiency of separation, low consumption of energy and environment-friendly procedure.