We present the first comprehensive and systematic review on the structurally diverse toco-chromanols and -chromenols found in photosynthetic organisms, including marine organisms, and as metabolic intermediates in animals.

The plant Garcinia kola is used in African ethno-medicine to treat various oxidation- and inflammation-related diseases but its bioactive compounds are not well characterized. Garcinoic acid (GA) is one of the few phytochemicals that have been isolated from Garcinia kola.We investigated the anti-inflammatory potential of the methanol extract of Garcinia kola seeds (NE) and purified GA, as a major phytochemical in these seeds, in lipopolysaccharide (LPS)-activated mouse RAW264.7 macrophages and its anti-atherosclerotic potential in high fat diet fed ApoE−/− mice.This study outlines an optimized procedure for the extraction and purification of GA from Garcinia kola seeds with an increased yield and a purity of >99%. We found that LPS-induced upregulation of iNos and Cox2 expression, and the formation of the respective signaling molecules nitric oxide and prostanoids, were significantly diminished by both the NE and GA. In addition, GA treatment in mice decreased intra-plaque inflammation by attenuating nitrotyrosinylation. Further, modulation of lymphocyte sub-populations in blood and spleen have been detected, showing immune regulative properties of GA.Our study provides molecular insights into the anti-inflammatory activities of Garcinia kola and reveals GA as promising natural lead for the development of multi-target drugs to treat inflammation-driven diseases.

Vitamin B12 is a critical micronutrient in a vegan diet and thus dietary sources are limited and often low in the vitamin. Analytical determination of vitamin B12 requires laborious sample preparations including the proteolytic breakdown of the (food) matrix with proteases and the enrichment of the vitamin via immunoaffinity methods. Proteases like pepsin have an animal origin and thus might contain significant amounts of vitamin B12. We hypothesize that pepsin preparations potentially transfer residual vitamin B12 into the sample and falsify results. Hence the aim of our study was to determine trace amounts of cyano‐cobalamin by LC‐MS/MS in commercial protease enzyme preparations. The use of a stable 15N‐labeled cyano‐cobalamin as internal standard enabled us to detect vitamin B12 with a LOQ as low as 0.7 µg/l. Significant amounts of the vitamin were found in pepsin whereas the vitamin B12 content of papain preparations was below the detection limit. We conclude that sample preparation with pepsin bears the risk of false positive results, especially for samples with low vitamin B12 content, and we therefore recommend papain as an alternative protease for food sample preparation.

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