Antioxidant activities of sulfated polysaccharides from brown and red seaweeds

Abstract

The in vitro antioxidant activities of the following six sulfated polysaccharides were investigated: iota, kappa and lambda carrageenans, which are widely used in the food industry, fucoidan (homofucan) from the edible seaweed Fucus vesiculosus and fucans (heterofucans) F0.5 and F1.1 from the seaweed Padina gymnospora. With respect to the inhibition of superoxide radical formation, fucoidan had an IC 50 (the half maximal inhibitory concentration) of 0.058 mg I mL j1 , while the IC 50 for the kappa, iota and lambda carrageenans were 0.112, 0.332 and 0.046 mg I mL j1 , respectively. All of the samples had an inhibitory effect on the formation of hydroxyl radicals. The results of peroxidation tests showed that fucoidan had an IC 50 of 1.250 mg I mL j1 and that the kappa, iota and lambda carrageenans had an IC 50 of 2.753 and 2.338 and 0.323 mg I mL j1 , respectively.Fucan fractions showed low antioxidant activity relative to fucoidan. These results clearly indicate the beneficial effect of algal polysaccharides as antioxidants.

Properties of polysaccharides in several seaweeds from Atlantic Canada and their potential anti-influenza viral activities

“…Increasing research on algal polysaccharides, in native form or their derivatives, have revealed a variety of biological activities including anti-virus (Ghosh, Chattopadhyay et al 2009;Harden, Falshaw et al 2009), antioxidant (Josephine, Amudha et al 2007; Rocha de Souza, Marques et al 2007), anti-tumor (Zhou, Sun et al 2004;YamasakiMiyamoto, Yamasaki et al 2009), anticoagulant/anti-thrombotic (Pereira, Mulloy et al 1999;Pomin and Mourco 2008), and immuno-inflammatory activities (Groth, Grunewald et al 2009;Yang, Yu et al 2011). …”

Free radical scavenging activity of extracts from seaweeds Macrocystis pyrifera and Undaria pinnatifida: applications as functional food in the diet of prawn Artemesia longinaris

“…Our results demonstrated that the components of water-soluble extracts isolated from M. pyrifera had different composition to those of U. pinnatifida, with higher fucoidan content in the latter. Fucoidans present in brown algae can be considered as potent natural antioxidants (Rupérez et al, 2002;Rocha De Souza et al, 2007;Wang et al, 2010) and their antioxidant activity depends on their structural features such as degree of sulfation, molecular weight, type of the major sugar and branching. For example, low molecular weight sulfated polysaccharides have shown better antioxidant activity than those of high molecular weight, this fact can be explained because smaller polysaccharides may incorporate into the cells more efficiently and donate protons more effectively compared to larger polysaccharides (Wijesecara et al, 2011).…”

Effect of sulfation on the antioxidant properties and in vitro cell proliferation characteristics of polysaccharides isolated from corn bran

“…Carbohydrate chain elongation may be due to the repulsive interaction between anionic groups and hydrogen bonds formed by a combination of sulfated groups and hydroxy groups on the sugar ring. As a result, a stretched helical structure is formed on part of the carbohydrate chain (de Souza et al, 2007), strengthening its capacity to combine with free radicals and providing polysaccharides with a higher active structure.…”

“…For example, the sulfated contrapuntal hydroxyl free radical of brown algae polysaccharides has shown strong scavenging ability (de Souza et al, 2007) and sulfated Ganoderma lucidum polysaccharides have also been associated with improved antitumor effects compared to native polysaccharides (Tao, Zhang, & Cheung, 2006).…”