The use of camellias as potential antioxidant agents
The genus Camellia presents a wide geographic distribution in which three species can be highlighted: Camellia japonica for ornamental purposes, Camellia oleifera for essential oil production, and Camellia sinensis for tea production. Among them, C. japonica is characterized by its associated high socioeconomic impact in Galicia (NW Spain) due to its abundance in gardens, since, to date, its use continues to be almost exclusively ornamental. However, different chemical characterizations carried out on Camellia genus have indicated a similar composition among different species, so it would be expected that C. japonica could be used for additional purposes [1]. These applications will be determined by the chemical composition of the part used, which in turn will be influenced by the variety of camellia and environmental factors (growing area, climate, soil). One of the parts of greatest interest are the flowers since it has been shown that the petals of C. japonica have a high content of phenolic compounds that make them potential sources of bioactive compounds for medicinal and cosmetic use [2]. In this work, a standard extraction (maceration) was carried out using a methanol: water mixture (60:40) as solvent to evaluate the bioactivity of the flowers of different varieties of C. japonica. Among the 8 varieties analyzed, two of them (Elegans variegated and Grandiflora Superba) were characterized by having a high antioxidant capacity, as observed in terms of 2,2-diphenyl-1-picrylhydrazyl (DPPH) radical scavenging activity of 136.5 and 86.8 μg/mL respectively. Overall, it can be concluded that camellias are a potential source of antioxidants with application in food and nutraceutical industries. ; The research leading to these results was supported by MICINN supporting the Ramón y Cajal grant for M.A. Prieto (RYC-2017-22891) and Juan de la Cierva Formation grant for T. Oludemi (FJC2019-042549-I); by Xunta de Galicia for supporting the program EXCELENCIA-ED431F 2020/12 and the pre-doctoral grant A.G. Pereira (ED481A-2019/0228). Authors are grateful to Ibero-American Program on Science and Technology (CYTED—AQUA-CIBUS, P317RT0003), to the Bio Based Industries Joint Undertaking (JU) under grant agreement No 888003 UP4HEALTH Project (H2020-BBI-JTI-2019) that supports the work of P. Garcia-Perez. The JU receives support from the European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation program and the Bio Based Industries Consortium. The project SYSTEMIC Knowledge hub on Nutrition and Food Security, has received funding from national research funding parties in Belgium (FWO), France (INRA), Germany (BLE), Italy (MIPAAF), Latvia (IZM), Norway (RCN), Portugal (FCT), and Spain (AEI) in a joint action of JPI HDHL, JPI-OCEANS and FACCE-JPI launched in 2019 under the ERA-NET ERA-HDHL (n° 696295). ; info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersion