Development of overlapping repeated separation of steviol glycosides with counter current chromatography and a comparison with a conventional repeated separation method

Repeated separation is a valuable method in counter current chromatography, especially on a preparative scale. It can greatly reduce the separation time and the consumption of solvent. In this study, an overlapping repeated separation method was developed. Meanwhile, this method was used to separate steviol glycosides and compared with conventional repeated separationmethod. The results show that both methods are effective ways for countercurrent chromatography to prepare compounds but the overlapping repeated separation method requires fewer time and solvent than the conventional repeated separation method. So this novel repeated separation method has enormous potential for a preparative separation of target compounds and is very useful for the high- throughput purification of natural products.