Volatile composition, antidiabetic, and anti-obesity potential of leaf and flowering top extracts.

Context: Ten. (Brassicaceae) is an edible plant with very limited available information. Previous studies have demonstrated the polyphenolic profile and the antioxidant and cytotoxic properties of the leaf and flowering top hydroalcoholic extracts.

Objective: The volatile composition and the antidiabetic and anti-obesity potential of leaf and flowering top extracts have been investigated.

Material And Methods: The volatile characterization of the extracts was attained by HS-SPME-GC/MS analysis. The antidiabetic and anti-obesity potential was investigated spectrophotometrically by the ability to modulate pancreatic lipase and α-glucosidase at different concentrations using orlistat and acarbose as reference drugs. The inhibition of advanced glycation end-products (AGEs) was measured with aminoguanidine as reference and the antioxidant activity with the xanthine/xanthine oxidase system and Trolox for comparative purposes.

Results: Several volatiles belonging to different chemical classes were identified, being sulphur compounds the most abundant in both leaf and flowering top extracts (56.33% and 64.40% of all volatiles). Although the leaf extract showed lower IC values in most of the assays (0.968 and 1.921 mg/mL for α-glucosidase; 0.192 and 0.262 mg/mL for AGEs; 0.022 and 0.038 mg/mL for superoxide scavenging), there were no statistically significant differences between both samples. These extracts showed a similar behaviour to Trolox in the xanthine oxidase assay (IC values of 0.022 mg/mL for leaf extract; 0.038 mg/mL for flowering top and 0.028 for Trolox).

Conclusions: Leaves and flowering tops from can be used as sources of functional compounds that could act as antidiabetic and anti-obesogenic agents.