Development of Fingerprinting Methods of Balacaturbhadrika Churna: An Ayurvedic Formulation

Balacaturbhadrika churna is an Ayurvedic formulation widely used in diarrhoea, fever, cough and asthma. The present article is an attempt to establish the scientific basis of one of the reputed Ayurvedic formulation. Investigations were carried out to study the physicochemical, phytochemical and spectrophotometric analysis of formulation. The values of percent loss on drying, angle of repose, Hausner ratio, Carr's index of the lab formulation were calculated as 6.84 ± 0.224, 27.36, 1.25 and 20 respectively, which indicates the moisture contents of formulation is within the range and depict good flow characteristics. Total ash, acid insoluble ash and water soluble ash were found 8.148 ± 0.337, 3.281 ± 0.286, and 45.602 ± 0.414 respectively; the value of total ash indicates the inorganic contents of formulation are below the standard limits, above stated results were also compared with marketed formulation. Alcoholic and aqueous extracts of formulations and ingredients were prepared and evaluated for phytochemical analysis and the results of extractive values shows higher alcoholic extractive value (39.294 ± 2.226) of formulation depict that alcohol is a better solvent for extraction. Three laboratory batches of formulation and Piper longum powder were estimated for their piperine content against standard piperine solution on double beam UV-Visible spectrophotometer at λ max 342.5 nm.