Plants from the eudicot Celastraceae family are primarily cultivated for ornamental use due to their colourful autumn foliage, and, as such, their chemical composition is rarely investigated. In total, 125 samples from, altogether, 40 shrub, vine and tree species (
Catha,
Celastrus
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Plants from the eudicot Celastraceae family are primarily cultivated for ornamental use due to their colourful autumn foliage, and, as such, their chemical composition is rarely investigated. In total, 125 samples from, altogether, 40 shrub, vine and tree species (
Catha,
Celastrus,
Euonymus,
Gymnosporia,
Maytenus,
Parnassia, and
Tripterygium) were investigated to confirm tocotrienol dominance in the family, which was observed in the initial screenings. The tocochromanol–tocopherol (T) and tocotrienol (T3) contents ranged from 3.04 to 66.22 mg 100 g
−1 dw. Almost all the samples were tocotrienol-dominated (50.1–98.5% of total tocochromanols), except for
Parnassia. The two most prevalent compounds were γ-T3 and α-T3. Most
Euonymus species’ seeds contained primarily α-T3 (16.2–86.0% of total tocochromanols) and tocopherol (up to 35.0%), while the other species had higher γ-T3 (36.0–87.2%) and tocopherol (up to 29.9%) contents, except the
Parnassia samples, which contained primarily γ-T and δ-T. The highest total tocochromanol content was observed in
E. scandens, but it was highly variable. The content of α-T3 was less variable than γ-T3 (coefficients of variation of 0.74 and 1.46, respectively). This study shows that tocotrienols are predominant in the Celastraceae family. A streamlined ethanolic extraction protocol was evaluated and deemed suitable for routine screening and, potentially, bioactive extraction.
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