Rational Rubber Extraction and Simultaneous Determination of Rubber Content and Molecular Weight Distribution in Taraxacum kok-saghyz Rodin by Size-Exclusion Chromatography

Abstract

Taraxacum kok-saghyz Rodin (TKS) is a potential nature rubber source crop. To extract rubber from TKS effectively and quantitate the TKS rubber accurately, we developed a method that can simultaneously determine the rubber content and molecular weight distribution (MWD) of TKS by size-exclusion chromatography (SEC). The solvent types and rubber extraction schemes for sample pretreatment were discussed. The results indicated that the indirect ultrasonic method of extracting rubber from TKS roots required much shorter extraction time than conventional extraction method, and the scheme did not affect the characterization of MWD. In addition, SEC can be used for TKS rubber quantification with a limit of detection of 0.03 mg mL−1, and the intra-day and inter-day precision were 2.31% and 5.24%, respectively. The MWD of TKS rubber demonstrated a unimodal distribution. This developed method has been applied to the determination of real-life samples successfully.