Four crude water soluble polysaccharides, CABP, CAAP, CFVP and CLDP, were isolated from common edible mushrooms, including Agaricus bisporus, Auricularia auricula, Flammulina velutipes and Lentinus edodes, and their chemical characteristics and antioxidant properties were determined. Fourier Transform-infrared analysis showed that the four crude polysaccharides were all composed of β-glycoside linkages. The major monosaccharide compositions were D-galactose, D-glucose and D-mannose for CABP, CAAP and CLDP, while CFVP was found to consist of L-arabinose, D-galactose, D-glucose and D-mannose. The main molecular weight distributions of CABP and the other three polysaccharides were <5.1 × 104 Da and >66.0 × 104 Da, respectively. Antioxidant properties of the four polysaccharides were evaluated in in vitro systems and CABP showed the best antioxidant properties. The studied mushroom species could potentially be used in part of well-balanced diets and as a source of antioxidant compounds.

An edible fungal polysaccharide termed as ABP was obtained by extraction with hot water, and followed successive chromatographic purification using DEAE-Sepharose Fast Flow column and Sephacryl S-300 High-Resolution column. A symmetrical peak was obtained on high-performance size-exclusion chromatography with an average molecular weight of 5.17 × 104 Da, which was named ABP, and its main components were d-glucose and d-mannose. Based on the study of methylation analysis, along with FT-IR, GC, GC-MS, 1D 1H and 13C NMR and 2D NMR (H-HCOSY, TOCSY, HMQC, and NOESY), its chemical structure was featured with a repeating unit (1→6) linking β-d-Glcp as the main backbone with (1→4)-linked α-d-Manp units. The structure of the mainly repeating units of ABP was established as: →6)-β-D-Glucp-(1→4)-α-D-Manp(1→6)-β-D-Glucp-(1→6)-β-D-Glucp-(1→