Preparative isolation of anthocyanins from Japanese purple sweet potato (Ipomoea batatas L.) varieties by high-speed countercurrent chromatography.

Purple-fleshed sweet potatoes (Ipomoea batatas L.) contain a very complex anthocyanin profile due to the presence of several non-, mono-, and diacylated glucosides of cyanidin and peonidin. In this study, the anthocyanin composition of four Japanese purple sweet potato cultivars (Chiran Murasaki, Tanegashima Murasaki, Naka Murasaki, and Purple Sweet) were investigated by HPLC-DAD and ESI-MSn analyses. The HPLC chromatograms of the different cultivars show a remarkable variation of the two major pigments, cyanidin-3-(6''-caffeoylsophoroside)-5-glucoside and peonidin-3-(6''-caffeoylsophoroside)-5-glucoside, respectively. According to this, they can be categorized into two groups on the basis of the peonidin/cyanidin ratio: the cultivars Chiran Murasaki and Purple Sweet showed a high content of peonidin derivatives (peonidin type), whereas the varieties Tanegashima Murasaki and Naka Murasaki were classified as cyanidin types. By means of high-speed countercurrent chromatography (HSCCC) the nonacylated 3-sophoroside-5-glucoside of cyanidin was isolated on a preparative scale. Furthermore, it was possible to isolate the monoacylated cyanidin-3-(6''-caffeoylsophoroside)-5-glucoside as well as three diacylated major pigments, cyanidin-3-(6'',6'''-dicaffeoylsophoroside)-5-glucoside, cyanidin-3-(6''-caffeoyl-6'''-p-hydroxy-benzoylsophoroside)-5-glucoside, and peonidin-3-(6''-caffeoyl-6'''-p-hydroxybenzoyl-sophoroside)-5-glucoside. The purity and identity of the so-obtained pigments were confirmed by NMR measurements.