PRACTICAL REPORT ON THE ISOLATION AND IDENTIFICATION OF CODEINE AND PARACETAMOLPRACTICAL REPORT ON THE ISOLATION AND IDENTIFICATION OF CODEINE AND PARACETAMOL
AIM: To extract codeine and paracetamol from its tablet by solvent extraction and tentatively identify in comparison to standards using Thin Layer Chromatography.
INTRODUCTION:
Codeine or methyl morphine, an alkaloid, was first isolated in 1832 from raw opium. It concentration ranges from 0.2% to 0.8%. Mostly used for its analgesic, anti-tussive and anti-diarrheal capabilities (Tremlett, Anderson and Wolf, 2010). Paracetamol also known as acetaminophen (n-acetyl-p-aminophenol, APAP) on the other hand, is a useful non- steroidal anti- inflammatory drug (NSAID). It is commonly …show more content…

It was later discovered that, this is due to not allowing the chromatographic plate to develop for a longer period of time in the solvent tank. The solvent front also dried up quickly when the plate is taken out., making drawing a line at that point quite difficult. Fortunately, this was overcome by the use of visualizing spray and UV lamp.
Solvent extraction(liquid-liquid), involved selective movement of components of a substance in microgram to gram quantities between two immiscible liquid phase; its separation and selectivity is based on solubility differences and pH control respectively (Fifield and Kealey, 1995). This was observed when chloroform was added to the basified filtrate. After vigorous shaking and settling down, chloroform being more dense, composed the bottom layer, with the aqueous phase up. Liquid-liquid extraction often involved high volume of organic solvents and poor resolution of mixtures of organic materials (Fifield and Kealey, 1995).
Thin Layer Chromatography is usually employed in the qualitative analysis of mixtures of non-volatile compounds like pharmaceuticals (Skoog, et al., 2000). TLC can also be used to confirm the identity of an unknown sample ( Lewis and Evans, 2011). Dissolution of the codeine and paracetamol