title: Stability of curcumin in buffer solutions and characterization of its degradation products.
abstract: The degradation kinetics of curcumin under various pH conditions and the stability of curcumin in physiological matrices were investigated. When curcumin was incubated in 0.1 M phosphate buffer and serum-free medium, pH 7.2 at 37 degrees C, about 90% decomposed within 30 min. A series of pH conditions ranging from 3 to 10 were tested and the result showed that decomposition was pH-dependent and occurred faster at neutral-basic conditions. It is more stable in cell culture medium containing 10% fetal calf serum and in human blood; less than 20% of curcumin decomposed within 1 h, and after incubation for 8 h, about 50% of curcumin is still remained. Trans-6-(4'-hydroxy-3'-methoxyphenyl)-2,4-dioxo-5-hexenal was predicted as major degradation product and vanillin, ferulic acid, feruloyl methane were identified as minor degradation products. The amount of vanillin increased with incubation time.
authors.affiliation: Institute of Biochemistry, College of Medicine, National Taiwan University, Taipei, ROC.
authors.forename: Y J
authors.initials: YJ
authors.lastname: Wang
authors.forename: M H
authors.initials: MH
authors.lastname: Pan
authors.forename: A L
authors.initials: AL
authors.lastname: Cheng
authors.forename: L I
authors.initials: LI
authors.lastname: Lin
authors.forename: Y S
authors.initials: YS
authors.lastname: Ho
authors.forename: C Y
authors.initials: CY
authors.lastname: Hsieh
authors.forename: J K
authors.initials: JK
authors.lastname: Lin
mesh_terms: D000975:Antioxidants / Q000737:chemistry*; D002021:Buffers; D002851:Chromatography, High Pressure Liquid; D003470:Culture Media; D003474:Curcumin / Q000737:chemistry*; D004355:Drug Stability; D006801:Humans; D006863:Hydrogen-Ion Concentration; D007700:Kinetics
chemical_list: D000975:Antioxidants; D002021:Buffers; D003470:Culture Media; D003474:Curcumin