Novel Antiviral Fucoidan from Sporophyll of Undaria pinnatifida (Mekabu)

Abstract

Blown algae like wakame (Undaria pinnatifida) and kombu (Laminaria sp.) are popular foods in East Asia. These edible algae have been used as rich sources of minerals, vitamins and dietary fibers. They have been attracted recently as multifunctional foods for maintaining our health.Fucoidan (fucan sulfate) is a fucose-containing sulfated polysaccharide from brown algae such as Fucus vesiculosus, 1) Ecklonia kurome, 2) and Cladosiphon okamuranus.3) Fucoidans showed various biological activities like anticoagulant 4) and antivirus. 5) In addition, fucoidan prevents microvascular thrombus formation induced by endothelial damage in arterioles and venules in vivo.6) It is suggested that this activity is not attributable to inhibition of P-and L-selectin but instead to the anticoagulative capacity of fucoidan. Thus, fucoidan might be useful for anticoagulant, antiviral, and anti-thrombus formation agent.Mekabu is a sporophyll of U. pinnatifida and it is also used as a safe, inexpensive and savory food in Japan. It has been reported that Mekabu has potential for chemoprevention of human breast cancer since Mekabu extract shows strong suppressive effect on rat mammary carcinogenesis.7) In addition, Mekabu fucoidan showed antitumor effect in vivo and its mechanism was mediated by IFN-g activated NK cells.8) Although Mekabu fucoidan has been subjected to different kinds of biological evaluation, its structural feature is still unknown. This paper describes the structural characterization of Mekabu fucoidan as well as evaluation for its antiviral effects. Results and DiscussionAfter washing and crushing the dried alga, it was treated with EtOH to remove lipophyllic compounds. The defatted alga was then extracted with 0.15 N HCl to prevent extraction of alginates. After neutralization and precipitation with 4 vol. of EtOH, crude fucoidan (CF) was obtained. CF was successively fractionated by ion exchange column chromatographies on DEAE Toyopearl 650M and Q-Sepharose FF and gel filtration on Sephacryl S-300 HR. As indicated in Fig. 1, CF was separated to four fractions. The most abundant fraction (CF-4) was further fractionated by Q-Sepharose (Fig. 2), and the second eluate (CF-4B) was collected. Then CF-4B was applied to a gel filtration on Sephacryl S-300 HR (Fig. 3) and the most abundant fraction was collected as purified fucoidan.The fucoidan was eluted as a single peak, and its apparent molecular weight was estimated to be 9000 by HPLC on TSK gel GMPW XL . In addition, the electrophoretic pattern indicated that the electric charge of fucoidan was homogeneous (Fig. 4). These results revealed that the fucoidan might be a homogeneous polysaccharide on the basis of molecular Medicine, Toyama Medical and Pharmaceutical University; 2630 Sugitani, Toyama 930-0194, Japan: and c Riken Vitamin Co., Ltd.; 3 2-9-18 Misaki-cho, Chiyoda-ku, Tokyo 101-8370, Japan. Received April 8, 2004; accepted June 9, 2004 Structural characterization and antiviral activities of fucoidan from sporophyll of Undaria pinnatifida (Mekabu) was exa...

The effect of dietary laminarin and fucoidan in the diet of the weanling piglet on performance, selected faecal microbial populations and volatile fatty acid concentrations

“…Fucoidans are sulphated polysaccharides extracted from the cell wall of various species of brown seaweeds (Berteau and Mulloy, 2003). Fucoidans have been shown to have antitumour (Zhuang et al, 1995), antiviral (Lee et al, 2004) and antibacterial (McClure et al, 1992) properties. Overall, laminarin and fucoidan may offer a dietary means to modulate the gut environment and/or modulate immunity, thereby reducing the risk of diarrhoea and promoting productivity in the absence of in-feed antibiotics.…”

Performance of weanling piglets offered low-, medium- or high-lactose diets supplemented with a seaweed extract from Laminaria spp.

“…Fucoidans, the family of sulphated heteropolysaccharides, are composed mainly of a-1,3-linked L-fucose residues (Percival and Mc Dowell, 1967). Fucoidans have been shown to have antitumour (Zhuang et al, 1995), antiviral (Lee et al, 2004) and antibacterial (McClure et al, 1992) properties. Reilly et al (2008) showed that a combination of fucoidan and laminarin increased the volatile fatty acid (VFA) concentration in the colon of weaned pigs, indicating that these fractions were fermented by the microbial population in the colon.…”

Anti-herpes Simplex Virus Target of an Acidic Polysaccharide, Nostoflan, from the Edible Blue-Green Alga Nostoc flagelliforme

“…Many kinds of synthesized and algae-derived sulfated polysaccharides such as dextran sulfate, fucoidan, spirulan, and hornan have been reported to be antiviral components. [12][13][14][15][16][17][18][19] Some sulfated polysaccharides are known to inhibit both virus binding and penetration processes in the early phase of virus-cell interactions. In the present study, dextran sulfate was shown to have inhibitory effects on these two processes.…”