Chemical Compositions and Antioxidant Activity of Different Solvent Extracts from Propolis

Different solvents such as methanol, ethanol, chloroform and distilled water were used to extract propolis. The contents of total flavonoids and total phenols in different solvent extracts were analyzed. Meanwhile, reducing power and DPPH free radical scavenging capacity were determined to compare antioxidant activity of four different solvent extracts. Results indicated that methanol and ethanol extracts had strong antioxidant activity. The reducing power of methanol extract was as high as 1.162 at 0.25 mg/ml concentration of and scavenging rate of methanol extract for DPPH free radicals was 64.676% at 0.05 mg/ml concentration of. The sequential extractions using petroleum ether, chloroform, ethyl acetate and acetone were applied to ethanol extract of propolis. A maximum extraction efficiency was achieved using chloroform. The reducing power of chloroform-soluble extract reached 2.087 and the scavenging capacity for DPPH free radicals as high as 87.724% at 0.05 mg/ml concentration.