Multistage Extraction of Star Anise and Black Pepper Derivatives for Antibacterial, Antioxidant, and Anticancer Activity

Abstract

Recently, natural resources have attracted considerable interest for their applications in food security and human health problems. Traditional natural spices, such as star anise and black pepper, played important roles in the pharmaceutical and food industries due to their strong pharmacological activity, antioxidant potential and rare complications. In order to achieve biomasses from the natural product with multiple bioactivities, we developed the multistage extraction method to extract and separate various bioactive compounds from these natural plants. Our work demonstrated that various bioactive-rich extractives were achieved using steam distilled- or oxidative-extraction methods with high extraction yields and purity. Furthermore, the extractives in each step can be used not only as bioactive compounds, but also as a resource to further prepare different derivatives during the next extractive step, providing biomass-saving to a great extent. The extractives obtained with high yields and purities (>82%) were identified by 1H NMR, 13C NMR, FTIR, UV-vis, fluorescence spectroscopy, and high-performance liquid chromatography (HPLC). Moreover, these biomasses display potent antibacterial activities against some types of microorganisms such as S.aureus, S.pyogenes, E.coli, and S.typhi with a lowest MIC of 400 μg/ml for the development of antibacterial agents, significant antioxidant activity as the natural antioxidant for enhancing food shelf-life, and excellent anticancer activity that induces significant cancer cell apoptosis. This work showed the different multistage extracts from natural products, which enable them to be applied in the fields of the pharmaceutical industry and the food industry.

Comparison of the Phytochemical Composition and Antibacterial Activities of the Various Extracts from Leaves and Twigs of Illicium verum

“…Through comparison of our results with the published articles on the antimicrobial effect, we have found that although many reports included similar results to our findings [ 14 , 18 , 32 ], there were some studies that revealed results contrary to our findings [ 29 , 33 ]. This may be due to differences in bioassays selected, the microorganisms used to carry out the test (microbial strains, inoculum preparation techniques, inoculum size, growth medium, incubation conditions and endpoints determination), and the degree of solubility of each test extract obtained from different extraction methods [ 34 ].…”

“…Their work revealed that the various bioactive-rich extracts may be achieved by using steam distilled- or oxidative- extraction methods, which leads to high extraction yields with high purity. Moreover, their study also indicated that the extracts display antibacterial activities against various types of microorganisms, with the lowest MIC value being 400 μg/mL [ 29 ]. Although antimicrobial activities of I. verum fruits have been closely examined, previous studies have not determined the antibacterial effects and compositions of the leaves and twigs from I. verum .…”

Illicium verum (Star Anise) and Trans-Anethole as Valuable Raw Materials for Medicinal and Cosmetic Applications

“…Li et al [30] evaluated the antibacterial activity of I. verum essential oil, as well as anisic acid and shikimic acid, which occur in I. verum fruits. The antibacterial activity was evaluated against two Gram-positive bacteria: S. aureus (MRSA) and S. pyogenes, and three Gram-negative bacteria: E. coli, S. typhi and P. aeruginosa.…”

“…Li et al [30] evaluated the antioxidant activity of I. verum essential oil, as well as anisic acid and shikimic acid. The antioxidant activity evaluated with the DPPH assay showed that star anise oil, anisic acid and shikimic acid exhibited slight antioxidant activity compared to butylated hydroxytoluene (BHT) (IC 50 = 1.32 mg/mL), with an IC 50 equal to 9.88, 8.04 and 8.96 mg/mL, respectively.…”

Cellulose-based functional hydrogels derived from bamboo for product design

“…In biomedicine, the three-dimensional (3D) network structure of nanocellulose-based hydrogels is similar to that of human tissues. Additionally, nanocellulose-based hydrogels have good mechanical properties, biocompatibility, and renderability, which makes them widely used in the fields of drug delivery, tissue engineering, trauma dressing, and wearable sensors ( Li et al, 2014b , 2015 , 2021a , b , c , d , 2022b ; Li X. et al, 2019 ; Xing et al, 2020 ; Nik Nabil et al, 2022 ). Liu et al (2018) added aminated silver nanoparticles (Ag-NH 2 NPs) and gelatin (G) to TOCNF.…”