A sustainable process for the recovery of volatile constituents from Gracilaria lemaneiformis in agar production and evaluation of their antioxidant activities

BMC Chemistry

Xiaoli Ma¹  Shengliang Yuan²  Yingnian Lu²  Yanxia Huang²  Zhihong Duan²  Kefeng Wu² 

[1] Affiliated Hospital, Guangdong Medical University;Guangdong Key Laboratory for Research and Development of Natural Drugs, Guangdong Medical University;

关键词: Gracilaria lemaneiformis;    Volatile constituents;    Sustainable extraction;    Antioxidant;    GC–MS;   

DOI  :  10.1186/s13065-019-0590-y

来源: DOAJ

【 摘 要 】

Abstract Background Gracilaria lemaneiformis is a common red alga used as a raw material source for the agar industry. Its extract is rich in natural volatile constituents (VCs) having antioxidant activities. Herein, a sustainable method was used to recover VCs from the alga. The chemical composition of VCs present in the n-hexane fraction was analyzed by gas chromatography–mass spectroscopy (GC–MS) and the antioxidant potential was measured using a series of in vitro biochemical assays, including DPPH, hydroxyl, and superoxide radical scavenging assays. Results The recovery yield of the VCs was 0.823 wt% of the dry mass of G. lemaneiformis. A total of 25 VCs were successfully identified, comprising approximately 99.94% of the total volume. The major component was n-hexadecanoic acid (38.57%), followed by oleic acid (25.48%), arachidonic acid (12.84%), and tetradecanoic acid (2.52%). In addition, The VCs displayed strong free radical scavenging activity in the DPPH (IC50 = 21.56 mg/L), hydroxyl (IC50 = 18.34 mg/L), and superoxide (IC50 = 391.12 mg/L) radical scavenging assays. The antioxidant activities of the VCs exhibited a dose-dependence at concentrations ranging from 5 to 200 mg/L. Conclusion The results indicated that the sustainable process improved the agar quality and that the extract contained many natural VCs with antioxidant activities, which have the potential to be used in functional food and cosmetics instead of as a discarded byproduct of the agar industry.

【 授权许可】

Unknown