Correlation of Pharmacological action of Ignatia Amara Homoeopathic Mother tincture to its active principles employing High Performance Thin Layer Chromatography

Abstract

Ignatia contains a considerable amount of strychnine and Brucine, more indeed in proportion than Nux Vomica. It is these alkaloids that it owes much of its energy. In poisonous quantities, Ignatia causes tetanic spasms while in small doses, it cures the same symptoms. Ignatia exalts the impressionability of the incident nerves all over the body. It causes reflex excitation- twitching, constrictions, and spasms. This action is not deep and long lasting. Alternate set of symptoms are numbness, torpor. Ignatia acts specially on the Medulla oblongata and spinal nervous system giving rise to these tetanic convulsions. The entire nervous system gets affected making the system sensitive so much that there is intense acuteness of the nerves of sensation and of special senses and increased susceptibility of external impressions, mental and physical. If we were to correlate this with the pharmacological action of Strychnine and Brucine, all the actions of Ignatia can aptly be assigned to the pharmacological action of these two active principles. This can be verified by High Performance Thin Layer Chromatography which would help to segregate and identify the constituents present in the Ignatia Amra mother tincture and correlate their action with the pharmacological action of Ignatia Amra. Materials and Methods: Standard Ignatia Amara mother tincture was tested for its alkaloid markers and its correlation with the pharmacological action was studied. High Performance Thin Layer Chromatography was used for qualitative analysis if Ignatia Amra homoeopathic mother tincture. TLC Aluminium sheets with silica gel 60 F253 pre-coated layer (20cm x 10cm), thickness-0.2mm, no. of tracks-18, band length-6mm constituted the stationary phase. Chloroform: Methanol (9.5:0.5) constituted the mobile phase. The plate was developed in developing chamber and observed under U.V. Light. Results: Rf. Values of the Ignatia Amara homoeopathic mother tincture were observed at 0.67 and 0.70 which corresponds to the Rf. Value of Brucine which is 0.69. Superimposed UV Spectra of brucine standard shows y-max at 306nm whereas superimposed UV Spectra of strychnine standard shows y-max at 259nm which matches with the y-max shown by Ignatia Amra mother tincture one at 260nm and other at 306nm. Conclusion: Thus, it is evident from the chromatogram that Ignatia Amara homoeopathic Mother tincture contains both Brucine and Strychnine which is supported by evidence in the source books. This helps correlate the action of Ignatia Amara homoeopathic mother tincture with its active principles namely Brucine and Strychnine.