Preparative isolation of oleocanthal, tyrosol, and hydroxytyrosol from olive oil by HPCCC.

For the provision of oleocanthal (OLC), a phenolic compound with very promising pharmacological properties, isolation from olive oil is a very important option. Due to the compound's sensitivity to decomposition upon exposure to oxygen and light, a very gentle isolation method has been developed under use of high performance countercurrent chromatography (HPCCC). By partition of olive oil between hexane and methanol, an extract enriched in phenolics was prepared and subjected to a two-step HPCCC separation under use of heptane-EtOAc-MeOH-H2O mixtures in normal-phase and reverse phase mode, respectively.