Organizing co mmittee

OPTIMIZED METHOD FOR OBTAINING FUROCOUMARINS FROM 
Ficus carica LEAVES 
 
R.F. Mukhamatkhanova, D.E. Dusmatova, B.S. Okhundedaev, 
I.D. Sham’yanov, Sh.Sh. Sagdullaev 
S.Yu. Yunusov Institute of the Chemistry of Plant Substances, Academy of Sciences 
Republic of Uzbekistan, 100170, Tashkent, M. Ulugbek st., 77 
e-mail: [e-mail] 
With the development of new applications of photodynamic therapy in oncology and 
surgery (infected-inflammatory processes), the need for natural photosensitizers, 
including furocoumarines, has increased. 
Ficus carica
leaves are a good source of furocoumarines. A review of existing 
methods of producing furocoumarines psoralen and bergapten from 
Ficus carica
leaves 
showed that the main drawback of known methods of obtaining furocoumarines from 
Ficus carica
leaves is low their yield from plant raw material, as well as the use of toxic 
solvents. The low furocoumarines yield is due to the fact that the previously developed 
methods do not take into account the physico-chemical properties of the produced 
furocoumarines.
The inventive new method for producing psoralen and bergapten from the leaves of 
Ficus carica
eliminates the above-mentioned disadvantages, thereby increasing the 
yield of the target product. The optimized method includes extracting a chopped 
vegetable raw material with heated ethyl alcohol, which exhaustively extracts both 
aglycone and glycoside forms of furocoumarines; the target products are extracted from 
the solution after hydrolysis with ethylacetate; the chromatographic cleaning on the 
column is carried out first with petrol, then the target products are isolated by elution 
with a mixture of petrol-ethylacetate (1:1); the resulting technical sum is recrystallized 
from a mixture of petrol-ethylacetate (7:3). 
According to 
1
H NMR spectrum data, the sum of furocoumarines consists of a 
mixture of psoralen and bergapten in a ratio of 3:1. 
Spectral characteristics of the isolated product: 
IR (KBr, 

, сm
-1
): 3448, 3148, 2913, 2846, 1727 (С=О 

-lactone), 1631 (С=С), 
1577, 1542, 1468, 1449 (С=С), 1386, 1359, 1285, 1259, 1215, 1159, 1131 (С-О-), 
1021, 920, 894, 824, 749, 719, 604, 544, 448. 
PMR of psoralen (400 MHz, CDCl
3
): 6.32 (1Н, d, J = 9.55, H-3), 6.77 (1H, dd, J = 
1.01; 2.31, H-6), 7.40 (1H, d, J= 0.9, H-9), 7.62 (1H, s, H-5), 7.64 (1H, d, J = 2.27, H-
7), 7.75 (1H, d, J = 9.58, H-4). 
PMR of bergapten (400 MHz, CDCl
3
): 4.21 (3Н, s, ОСН
3
), 6.20 (1Н, d, J = 9.78, H-
3), 6.96 (1H, dd, J = 1.03; 2.43, H-6), 7.50 (1H, t, J= 0.84, H-9), 7.53 (1H, d, J = 2.42, 
H-7), 8.08 (1H, dd, J = 9.77; 0.59, H-4). 
The developed method is covered by the RUz patent IAP 06993 from 21.06.2022. 
O
O
O
O
O
O
OCH
3