Advanced Technologies for the Extraction of Marine Brown Algal Polysaccharides

Abstract

Over the years, brown algae bioactive polysaccharides laminarin, alginate and fucoidan have been isolated and used in functional foods, cosmeceutical and pharmaceutical industries. The extraction process of these polysaccharides includes several complex and time-consuming steps and the correct adjustment of extraction parameters (e.g., time, temperature, power, pressure, solvent and sample to solvent ratio) greatly influences the yield, physical, chemical and biochemical properties as well as their biological activities. This review includes the most recent conventional procedures for brown algae polysaccharides extraction along with advanced extraction techniques (microwave-assisted extraction, ultrasound assisted extraction, pressurized liquid extraction and enzymes assisted extraction) which can effectively improve extraction process. The influence of these extraction techniques and their individual parameters on yield, chemical structure and biological activities from the most current literature is discussed, along with their potential for commercial applications as bioactive compounds and drug delivery systems.(APS) is determined by algae species however it is also influenced by other factors causing inter-species variation, e.g., growth location and harvesting season [8]. Vast structural variation between the APS therefore presents a challenge in terms of pre-treatments application, extraction techniques and optimization, characterization of isolated fractions and determination of their biological properties.Chemical structure and yield of APS isolated from marine macroalgae by conventional extraction (CE) techniques can be affected by various experimental conditions (pH, time, temperature, pressure, particle size, solvent, sample to solvent ratio, agitation speed etc.). In addition, different advanced techniques such as microwave assisted extraction (MAE), ultrasound assisted extraction (UAE), pressurized liquid extraction (PLE), enzyme-assisted extractions (EAE) are assessed and applied for APS extraction [9][10][11].In general, the chemical structure of polysaccharides determines its physical, chemical and biochemical properties as well as its biological activities [12]. Several studies have reported that their biological activity is strongly associated with their chemical structure [9]. Due to very complex mechanisms that are affected by many factors, the correlation between polysaccharide structure and biological activity is still not sufficiently clarified.In order to improve isolation of APS, pre-treatments are usually applied to the algal biomass prior to the extraction process with the two aims: (i) to prevent co-extraction of interfering bioactive compounds with similar solubility; and (ii) to disrupt cell walls and improve mass transfer of APS into extraction solvent. The first type of pre-treatments is therefore used to remove compounds which are highly bound to the APS such as proteins, phenols and lipids, as well as mannitol and chlorophyll [13]. For that purpose, the application of various pr...

Sulfated Polysaccharides from Marine Algae as a Basis of Modern Biotechnologies for Creating Wound Dressings: Current Achievements and Future Prospects

“…In modern bandage materials, marine-, plant-, animal-, fungus-derived, or bacterial polysaccharides are used as passive natural polymer matrices. Such remarkable characteristics and unique properties as high biocompatibility, mechanical strength, flexibility, porosity, and biodegradability make natural polymers a very promising material as a framework for wound dressings [69][70][71][73][74][75][76].…”

“…During evolution, these organisms acquired the ability to synthesize a wide range of metabolites and biomolecules, many of which have a unique chemical structure that other organisms do not have [10,[53][54][55][56]76,77]. Polysaccharides from marine algae are of particular interest due to the high resistance, biological activity, and availability of these organisms in large numbers [21,59,61,69,74].…”

“…In recent decades, hydrogels, which are three-dimensional hydrophilic polymer chains consisting of 99% water, have become an example of the widespread use of seaweed-derived polysaccharides in wound dressing design and tissue engineering [70,74]. Due to the high biocompatibility, low immunogenicity and cytotoxicity, as well as the ease of functioning, these polymer systems are now actively used in wound treatment [10,21,44,54,[69][70][71][72].…”

“…Their structure is composed only of sulfated fucose residues and is regular, which significantly distinguishes them from fucoidans [16,17]. The chemical composition, structure, and biological properties of fucoidans are strongly dependent on the environmental conditions, season of collection, species of algae, and also on the technologies used for their fractional extraction and purification [69,74,121,122,124].…”

Fucoidan Induces Apoptosis of HT-29 Cells via the Activation of DR4 and Mitochondrial Pathway

“…Fucoidan is a water-soluble heteropolysaccharide, derived mostly from brown algae, such as Fucus vesiculosus (Figure 1) [1][2][3][4][5]. Recent studies have shown that the research on fucoidan mainly focuses on two aspects-one is to explore ways to increase the yield of fucoidan [6][7][8][9], while the other is to explore the various pharmacological activities of fucoidan [10][11][12], including anti-inflammatory [13,14], anti-tumor, anti-virus, hypolipidemic, antithrombotic, and so on [15], but less research exists on its mechanism. Owing to the characteristics of high incidence and high mortality of tumor, the prevention and treatment of tumor has become a global research trend.…”