Algal Polysaccharides as Therapeutic Agents for Atherosclerosis

Abstract

Seaweed-derived polysaccharides including agar and alginate, have found widespread applications in biomedical research and medical therapeutic applications including wound healing, drug delivery, and tissue engineering. Given the recent increases in the incidence of diabetes, obesity and hyperlipidemia, there is a pressing need for low cost therapeutics that can economically and effectively slow the progression of atherosclerosis. Marine polysaccharides have been consumed by humans for millennia and are available in large quantities at low cost. Polysaccharides such as fucoidan, laminarin sulfate and ulvan have shown promise in reducing atherosclerosis and its accompanying risk factors in animal models. However, others have been tested in very limited context in scientific studies. In this review, we explore the current state of knowledge for these promising therapeutics and discuss the potential and challenges of using seaweed derived polysaccharides as therapies for atherosclerosis.

Plant-Derived Biomaterials: A Review of 3D Bioprinting and Biomedical Applications

“…Thereafter the material is alkalinized and precipitated with sodium or calcium carbonate to generate an alginate salt. Vacuum filtration can then be used on the precipitated alginate to collect it (Fawzy et al, 2017;Patil et al, 2018). An alternative means of alginate production is through bacterial biosynthesis (Hay et al, 2013).…”

“…Hydrogels are designed to mimic the composition of natural extracellular matrix with high cellular biocompatibility (Aljohani et al, 2018), whilst demonstrating the viscoelastic properties to promote fluid dispersion through extrusion-based bioprinting methods. These features are readily exploited in the field of biomedicine; where alginate, nanocellulose, and other plant derived biomaterials are typically employed as model hydrogels (Cardoso et al, 2016) for tissue engineering, pharmaceutical drug delivery, and wound healing (Santana et al, 2013;Patil et al, 2018).…”

Brown-Algae Polysaccharides as Active Constituents against Nonalcoholic Fatty Liver Disease

“…Moreover, BAPs can be beneficial for the gut microbiota, thus ameliorating the gut-liver axis functionality [36]. More direct antisteatotic actions addressed to the regulation of hepatic lipid metabolism and liver functions might be related to the antioxidant and anti-inflammatory activities demonstrated for different BAPs in NAFLD experimental models [2,37,38]. The next paragraphs and ▶ Table 1 describe the results obtained for FU, ALG, and LAM.…”

Progress in Modern Marine Biomaterials Research

“…There is no open access data regarding a global ulvans market. It is known that ulvan containing green algae is consumed in Asian countries and are used in Chinese medicine [199]. Due to their high vitamin and fiber content, ulvans are also consumed in Europe [199].…”