Comparative botanical and phytochemical evaluation of Calotropis procera Linn. and Calotropis gigantea Linn. Root

The present study evaluates and develops pharmacognostical and phytochemical descriptors (HPTLC) of Calotropis procera and Calotropis gigantea for their quality control. β – sitosterol one of the major terpene content of this species, which is a potent antioxidant, purgative, antispasmodic and expectorant, has also been studied through a simple and high-precision method using high performance thin layer chromatography (HPTLC), which may be utilized by pharmacological drug industries for quality evaluation, ensuring successful commercial exploitation of this drug. From the present study it has been observed that both Calotropis procera and C. gigantea have similar microscopic characteristics, physico-chemical parameters studied showed a little variation as total ash components and total extractive values are little less in C. gigantea. HPTLC studies also showed similar qualitative profile with some quantitative variations in total β-sitosterol, which was higher in C. gigantea (2.79%).