Peel extracts of two Iranian cultivars of pomegranate (Punica granatum) have antioxidant and antimutagenic activities

Abstract

Peels of two Iranian pomegranate cultivars were dried, powdered and extracted in a Soxhlet extractor with methanol, ethanol, acetone and water for 4 h each. Extracts were pooled together and dried. The dried extracts were used to determine their antioxidant capacity by the formation of phosphomolybdenum complex and antimutagenicity against the mutagenicity of sodium azide by the Ames test. The peel extracts of both cultivars exhibited marked antioxidant capacity, but at each concentration, this capacity was higher in Aghamohammadali cultivar than that of Malas-Saveh. Peel extracts of both cultivars decreased sodium azide mutagenicity in Salmonella typhimurium strains (TA100 and TA1535) strongly, except for Malas-Saveh cultivar extract at 625 mg/plate concentration that decreased sodium azide mutagenicity moderately. The peel extracts of both cultivars showed an increase in total phenolics, antioxidant capacity and antimutagenicity with increase in concentration. The overall results showed that the pomegranate peel extracts have both antioxidant and antimutagenic properties and may be exploited as biopreservative in food applications and neutraceutical, specially when the extracts be obtained by use of a mixture of solvents. © 2006 Asian Network for Scientific Information.