Resumen

LOPEZ HERNANDEZ, Orestes Darío et al. Spray drying of water extract from Bidens alba L. at laboratory and at testing bed. Rev Cubana Plant Med [online]. 2008, vol.13, n.4. ISSN 1028-4796.

INTRODUCTION: Bidens alba L. is known as "romerillo and romerillo blanco". It is traditionally used as herbal tea, as expectorant for colds, as antiseptic, diuretic, and digestant, and also for treating aphthae. It posseses experimentally assessed properties such as antiulcerative , antifungal and antibacterial substance in skin and mucosae. The phytochemical studies revealed the presence of phytosterols, tannins, polysaccharides, karotens, flavonoids, amines, terpenes and reducing sugars. The wide diversity of pharmacological actions attributed to this plant derives from the number of chemical components that it has, that is why, it is considered a potential source of raw material for the pharmaceutical industry. OBJETIVES: to determine the concentration of soluble starch or maltodextrine that allows reaching the highest performance in the spray drying of water extract from B. alba as well as the procedure at the test bed to evaluate the reproducibility of the drying method at upper scales. METHODS: water extract from B. alba was used. Several runs were performed using a lab spray dryer, at different maltodextrine and soluble starch concentrations. The influence of additive concentration on the recovery of product was analyzed. RESULTS: the highest performance was reached when using soluble starch and Aerosil 200. CONCLUSIONS: the use of a mixture soluble starch (45 %) and Aerosil 200 (1 %) gives rise to a 95 % performance powder.

Palabras clave : Spray drying; Bidens alba; water extract; performance; additives.