Chemistry Paper Abstracts (Author Abstract‪)‬

COMPARATIVE STUDY OF BITTER GOURD (Mormodica charantia) AND TURMERIC (Curcuma longa) USING HIGH PERFORMANCE LIQUID CHROMATOGRAPHY (HPLC). Sunde M. Jones, Nagarajan Vasumathi, Nixon Mwebi, Mijitaba Hamissou.Department of Chemistry and Biology, Jacksonville State University, Jacksonville, AL 36265. The bitter gourd (Mormodica charantia) or melon is a plant that has many properties and uses in the medical field. It is part of the family cucurbitaceae. This plant is native to Southeast Asia, China, Africa, and the Caribbean countries. Turmeric (Curcuma longa) or Curcuma longa is also a plant that has similar medicinal properties. Turmeric is a rhizome type herb that is a perennial plant of the ginger family. The main ingredient present in the turmeric is curcumin, found to be an antioxidant. It is mostly produced in India. It is used as a spice and called the Indian saffron. In this research experiment, the bitter gourd properties were tested and compared to turmeric to see how they were related. We prepared three different extracts of bitter gourd fruit using water for one, methanol and hexane for the other two. For turmeric, a solution of turmeric powder was prepared using methanol. The aqueous solution of bitter gourd and its residue were extracted and separated into different fractions using different solvents. Each fraction was analyzed by HPLC (High Performance Liquid Chromatography)