Antioxidant and anti food-borne bacterial activities of extracts from leaf and different fruit parts of Myristica fragrans Houtt

Abstract

The main products of Myristica fragrans are the dried seed (nutmeg) and aril (mace), which are used as spices or condiments to flavor foods. In this study, its leaf and different parts of fruit (pericarp, aril, seed-kernel and shell) were compared for their total phenolic content, antioxidant and anti food-borne bacterial capacities. The 80% methanol extracts of aril, seed-kernel and shell shared the highest total phenolic content with shell extract acted as the greatest primary antioxidant, by having the highest ferric reducing antioxidant power (FRAP) activity (EC50 9.7±0.1μg/mL), β-carotene-bleaching activity (EC50 21.5±2.7μg/mL) and 1,1-diphenyl-2-picrylhydrazyl (DPPH) scavenging activity (EC50 160.9±13.9μg/mL), whereas the pericarp extract exhibited highest secondary antioxidant activity as a metal chelator (EC50 75.6±14.4μg/mL). Only the aril and seed-kernel extracts were found to inhibit the food-borne bacteria with the lowest minimum inhibition concentration of 50μg/mL, against Staphylococcus aureus (ATCC12600) and Bacillus cereus (ATCC10876). Our findings suggest the possibility of using the aril and seed-kernel extracts as natural food preservative and other parts as a new source of natural antioxidant for food and pharmaceutical industries.