PlantCrystals—Nanosized Plant Material for Improved Bioefficacy of Medical Plants

Abstract

PlantCrystals are obtained by milling plant material to sizes <10 µm. Due to the disruption of the plant cells, active compounds are easily released, rendering the PlantCrystal technology an effective and low-cost process for the production of environmentally friendly plant extracts. The extracts can be used to produce phytomedicines, nutritional supplements or cosmetic products. Previous studies could already demonstrate the use of PlantCrystals to improve the antimicrobial or antifungal activity of different plants. This study investigated whether PlantCrystal technology is suitable to produce plant derived formulations with high antioxidant capacity. The study also aimed to identify the most suitable production methods for this. Methods: Various plant materials and parts of plants, i.e., seeds, leaves and flowers, and different methods were employed for the production. PlantCrystals were characterized regarding size, physical stability and antioxidant capacity (AOC). Results: PlantCrystals with particles <1 µm were produced from the different plant materials. Both production methods, i.e., high-pressure homogenization, bead milling or the combination of both were suitable to obtain PlantCrystals. Nano milling of the plant material greatly affected their AOC and resulted in formulations with distinctly higher AOC when compared to classical extracts. Conclusions: Rendering plant material into small sized particles is highly effective to obtain plant extracts with high biological efficacy.

Improved Antioxidant Capacity of Black Tea Waste Utilizing PlantCrystals

“…The PlantCrystal technology is a simple method to produce ecofriendly and sustainable plant extracts [ 5 ]. The process does not require organic solvents and can be scaled up easily.…”

“…Recent studies showed that PlantCrystals, i.e., nanosized plant materials, are a novel formulation strategy to increase the solubility and potential of plant molecules and this has already been proved for many different plants in previous studies [ 3 , 4 , 5 , 6 ]. PlantCrystals are composed of plants, parts of plants or plant wastes and can be produced by different wet milling methods, i.e., bead milling or high-pressure homogenization [ 5 ]. The particle size of PlantCrystals is below 10 µm, which ensures the complete destruction of all intact plant cells leading to more efficient extraction of the plant material without the use of organic solvents ( Figure 1 ) [ 5 ].…”

“…PlantCrystals are composed of plants, parts of plants or plant wastes and can be produced by different wet milling methods, i.e., bead milling or high-pressure homogenization [ 5 ]. The particle size of PlantCrystals is below 10 µm, which ensures the complete destruction of all intact plant cells leading to more efficient extraction of the plant material without the use of organic solvents ( Figure 1 ) [ 5 ]. PlantCrystal technology is a promising, smart and easy method, which allows using the whole plants or even their wastes in pharmaceutics and cosmetics [ 3 , 4 , 5 , 7 ].…”

“…Using this ecofriendly method to improve the antioxidant capacity of plants is already proven [ 5 ]. The aim of this study was to go one step further and use plant waste to produce antioxidant formulations.…”

“…To improve the AOC of BT waste and extract the insoluble molecules with antioxidative properties without using organic solvents, BT waste was milled to sizes well below the plant cell size. Since it is demonstrated that this PlantCrystal technology is suitable to improve the extraction efficacy of active compounds upon plant nanomilling procedure, total polyphenol content (TPC), total flavonoid content (TFC), total carotenoid content (TCC) must be determined [ 5 ]. Furthermore, fresh BT leaves were nano milled to compare its PlantCrystals antioxidant capacity to those of waste PlantCrystals.…”