Several simple UV spectrophotometric methods of assay are available for the estimation of ephedrine in pharmaceutical formulations. A. Method I B. Method II C. Method III

Ephedrine occurs as a waxy solid or as crystalline particles. Its IUPAC name is (R*,S*)-2-(methylamino)-1-phenylpropan-1-ol and has the molecular formula C10H15NO1. It has a bitter taste, is odourless or has a slight aromatic odour. In warm weather it slowly volatilizes. The anhydrous substance melts at 36°C and the hemi-hydrate melts at 42°C. It is a…

Ephedrine Source It is the principal alkaloid of the species of Ephedra (Ephedraceae) and was first isolated from Ma Huang, one of the oldest known drugs. Identified as Ephedra vulgaris var Helvetica, Ma Huang consists of the entire plant or tops of various Ephedra species including E. sinica and E. equisetina from China, E. gerardiana, E. intermedia and E. major from India and Pakistan. The plants are small…

In India raw drugs pertaining to some 7,500 medicinal plant species are claimed to be used in traditional medical systems. Many of these drugs are used in folk medicine in contrast to the more systematic and well-validated traditional medicine such as Ayurveda and Siddha which use much lesser number of carefully selected species. It is…

Up to mid-19th century, the beginning of the era of natural products, plant-derived drugs remained structurally ill-defined. Plant active constituent isolations from crude drugs were successful when the yield was sufficient and the compounds were more amenable to the then available methods of isolations. However such isolations were not possible for most biologically active crude…