Abstract
BackgroundFor many years chemical preservatives have been used in food, to act as either antimicrobials or antioxidants or both. In general, consumers regard additive-free foods as safer since preservatives can cause health hazards like asthma and cancer and are suspected to be mutagenic and neurotoxic. The present study was carried out to evaluate the antimicrobial and antioxidant activity of methanolic extracts of seaweeds, with a view to developing safer food preservatives.MethodsTen edible seaweeds, which have wide pharmaceutical application, were collected from Central Marine Fisheries Research Institute, Tamil Nadu, India and evaluated for antioxidant and antimicrobial activity against food borne pathogens.ResultsThe results indicate that Gelidiella acerosa has the highest antioxidant activity while Haligra sps exhibited antibacterial activity against Staphylococcus aureus (MTCC 96).ConclusionQuantitative analysis of the total phenolic content of the seaweeds indicated that Gelidella acerosa and Haligra sps have high phenolic contents, which correlated to their respective antioxidant and antimicrobial activity
Highlights
For many years chemical preservatives have been used in food, to act as either antimicrobials or antioxidants or both
The results show that G. acerosa had the highest DPPH scavenging activity (72.5 ± 2.78%) among the seaweeds, significantly (P < 0.05) higher than that of the standard BHT (70 ± 2%)
This indicates that G. acerosa as a good source of natural antioxidants
Summary
For many years chemical preservatives have been used in food, to act as either antimicrobials or antioxidants or both. These cause a loss in food quality but are believed to be associated with carcinogenesis, mutagenesis, arthritis, diabetes, inflammation, cancer and genotoxicity [7,8,9] To overcome these problems a wide range of synthetic antimicrobial agents (sodium benzoate, calcium benzoate, sorbate) and synthetic antioxidants (butylhydroquinone, propyl gallate, butylated hydroxy toluene (BHT), butylated hydroxy anisole (BHA) [10], have been used as food preservatives. These preservatives can cause liver damage and are suspected to be mutagenic and neurotoxic. The main objective of the present study is to evaluate the antioxidant and antimicrobial activities of seaweeds obtained from the Thondi, South Coastal Area of Tamil Nadu, India
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