PHYSICOCHEMICAL CHARACTERISATION OF SUVARNA BHASMA AND SUVARNA PRASHA USING ADVANCED TECHNIQUES

Background: Suvarna Prashana is an ancient Indian practice that boosts immunity, intelligence, memory, complexion, and virility and prevents infections in children. However, the characterisation of the drug is very limited. Material and Method: In this study, the physicochemical characterisation of Suvarna Bhasma is done with Scanning Electron Microscopy (SEM), Transmission Electron Microscopy (TEM), Energy Dispersive Xray Analysis (EDAX ), X-ray Diffraction (XRD), X-ray Photoelectron Spectroscopy (XPS), and Suvarna Prash containing 15 mg of Suvarna Bhasma mixed with 0.25 ml of ghee and 0.75 ml of honey is characterised with Fourier Transform Infrared Spectroscopy (FTIR) with Suvarna Bhasma. Results: SEM revealed that gold particles of Suvarna Bhasma ranged from 27 nm - 8.1 µm and formed spherical aggregates of varied sizes with rough surfaces. EDAX suggested that Suvarna Bhasma contained Gold (86.3%), Oxygen (3.14%), and Carbon (10.52%). TEM reported that the particle size ranged from 2.2 to 18.9 nm, which existed in polycrystalline form as suggested by XRD. XPS confirmed the elemental state of gold Au(0), Silver-Ag +oxidation state, Carbon C-C, C=O, and C-N, where carbon is bonding with carbon, oxygen and nitrogen. FTIR revealed that Suvarna Bhasma alone had a single functional group of alkynes. When Suvarna Bhasma was triturated with honey and ghee, many functional groups were added to Suvarna Bhasma, i.e. fats, carbohydrates and amino acids. Conclusion: In this novel study, FTIR of Suvarna Prasha is reported for the first time, and it can be used as a fingerprint for drug identification. Also, it proves that Suvarna Bhasma, used in the current study, is a pure form of gold without heavy metals like mercury.