Radical Scavenging and Antioxidant Activity of Carthamus tinctorius Extracts

Free radicals induce numerous diseases by lipid peroxidation, protein peroxidation, and DNA damage. It has been reported that numerous plant extracts have antioxidant activities to scavenge free radicals. In the present study, we examines the in vitro radical scavenging and antioxidant capacity of Crude extract of Carthamus tinctorius by using different in vitro analytical methodologies such as total antioxidant activity determination by ferric thiocyanate, hydrogen peroxide scavenging, 1,1-diphenyl-2-picryl-hydrazyl free radical (DPPH) scavenging, 2,2′-azino-bis(3-ethylbenzthiazoline-6-sulfonic acid) (ABTS) radical scavenging activity and superoxide anion radical scavenging by riboflavin–methionine-illuminate system. Also, butylated hydroxyanisole (BHA), butylated hydroxytoluene (BHT) and α-tocopherol were used as the reference antioxidant radical scavenger compounds.

Extract inhibited 94.50% lipid peroxidation of linoleic acid emulsion at 20 μg/mL concentration. On the other hand, the above mentioned standard antioxidants indicated an inhibition of 93.75%, 96.66% and 83.33% on peroxidation of linoleic acid emulsion at 60 μg/mL concentration, respectively. In addition, hydrogen peroxide scavenging, DPPH scavenging, ABTS+ radical scavenging and superoxide anion radical scavenging. Also, those various antioxidant activities were compared to BHA, BHT and α-tocopherol as references antioxidant compounds. The present study shows that Extract is the effective natural antioxidant component.