4 Identification, isolation, purification and characterization of active ingredients in crude extracts from herbal plants is now possible relatively easily because of development and implementation of high resolution separating analytical techniques like RP-HPLC.5 and 6 Among these bioactive compounds, there has been current explosion of interest in areas of distilled essential oils from fresh leaves, roots, stems and root sources of plant parts. These essential oils of plant contain phytochemicals. Selleckchem AUY 922 Among these phytochemicals, the major essential oil eugenol, a phenolic

compound (l-hydroxy-2-methoxy-4-allylbenzene) is widely distributed.7 Eugenol can be predominantly extracted from various species and families of aromatic plants and comprise about 70–85% in many essential oils (Fig. 1).8 Several studies have reported pharmacological mode of action of eugenol from medicinal plants such as Ocimum sanctum (leaf), Anethum sowa Roxb (leaf), Pimpinella anisum Linn. (leaf), Alpinia galanga wild (rhizome), Salvadora

persica Linn. (leaf) and Vetiveria zizanioides (root) in experimental animal systems 9, 10, 11, 12, 13 and 14 as hepatoprotective agent, vasorelaxing action, 15 as an attractant to fruit fly, 16 membrane stabilizing properties useful in the treatment of neurological, allergic disorders, anti-tubercular activity, 7 and has antinociceptive potential to be used as dental analgesic. 10 Various methods such as HPLC mass spectrophotometry using offline dansyl chloride derivatization VE-821 clinical trial has been carried for detection of lower limit of eugenol.17 and 18 Additionally, HPLC–UV method has been successfully used for determination of eugenol in Syzygium aromaticum Linn (Clove) and Cinnamomum zeylanicum (cinnamon oils) by using NDBD-F as a labelling reagent. 19 However, these systems are relatively costly and are increasingly complicated. The use of costly polymer based columns and absence of organic phase have contributed to difficulties in developing viable and cheaper RP-HPLC analysis. Although there are many chromatographic

methods currently utilized for quantification of eugenol from various fruits, vegetables, leaves etc but virtually not much work has much been validated and used for estimation and quantification of eugenol from commercial formulations. Hence, an alternative method needs to be developed for determination of such essential oil which is simpler, reliable and offers results in shorter span of time. Present study aims in development of reliable, cost effective and validated analytical method for separation and quantification of eugenol from commercial formulation of Caturjata Churna, Lavangadi Vati, Jatiphaladi Churna, Sitopaladi Churna and clove oil like commonly eugenol containing formulation by HPLC using photodiode array detector.