WATER-SOLUBLE VITAMIN IN TEN WILD EDIBLE FRUITS CONSUMED BY THE TRIBAL PEOPLE OF NORTH-EASTERN REGION IN INDIA: SIMULTANEOUS ESTIMATION BY HIGH-PERFORMANCE LIQUID CHROMATOGRAPHY (HPLC) METHOD

The present study aimed to develop a reversed-phase high-performance liquid chromatographic method for the simultaneous quantitation of water-soluble vitamins like ascorbic acid (C), thiamine (B1), riboflavin(B2), niacin (B3), pantothenic acid (B5), pyridoxine (B6) and folic acid (B9) in ten potent wild edible fruits named Artocarpus gomezianus, Baccurea sapida, Cyclanthera pedata, Flacourtia jangomas, Gymnopetalum cochinchinense, Hodgsonia heteroclite, Prunus nepaulensis, Spondias axillaris, Terminalia bellirica and Zhanthoxylum armatum consumed by the tribal people of North-eastern region in India. The chromatographic separation of vitamins was carried out on Acclaim C 18 column (5 μm particle size, 250 x 4.6 mm), Dionex Ultimate 3000 liquid chromatography, and detection was carried out at three different wavelengths (210, 245 and 254 nm) using a mobile phase of acetonitrile and aqueous trifluoroacetic acid (TFA, 0.01% v/v) solution with gradient elution. The experimental results showed that for different plants, the vitamin C content ranged between0.05 ± 0.001to 4.99 ± 0.03 mg/100g dry plant material (DPM). The B2 content was determined high in F. jangomas (0.62 ± 0.013 mg/100g DPM), and a significant amount of B9 (1.87± 0.03mg/100g) was detected in this plant. The investigation results showed that these plants are rich sources of vitamins, which can contribute immensely to nutrition and food security. The high percentage of recovery and low detection limit confirm the suitability of the method for simultaneous quantification of vitamins in these ten wild edible fruits.