Analytical Standards of Boswellic Acids and Their Separation

Getting to the Heart of Frankincense

The trees of the genus boswellia have been used in traditional medicine for thousands of years as an anti-inflammatory agent. Its resin is known as frankincense or olibanum and is still widely used in dietary supplements and in herbal medicinal products. The most characteristic components are a group of pentacyclic triterpene acids of which β-boswellic acids are the major biologically active constituents. Sigma-Aldrich offers six boswellic acids as analytical standards and two neat standards of α+β mixtures for use in research and quality control.

Separation of Boswellic Acids

Several conditions, using a variety of solid phases, have been screened for their suitability to separate six boswellic acids. The shortest analysis time was achieved using an Ascentis^® Express Column (2.7 µm particle size, L × I.D. 10 cm × 3.0 mm) and acetonitrile/phosphoric acid as eluents.

Figure 2 shows the chromatograms of the ethanolic extract of a boswellia herbal supplement as well as of a mixture of the six analytical standards.

Figure 2. Experimental Conditions and Chromatograms for the Separation of Boswellic Acids

We are continuously expands its offering of analytical standards for plant constituents, intended for the analysis of medicinal plants and herbal medicinal products.

On our Web page at sigma-aldrich.com/medicinalplants, you will find an up-to-date list of all phytopharma standards sorted in alphabetical order; by substance class and by genus of a large number of the most popular medicinal plants.

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