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Brown algae and barley-based anti-obesity food and its safety in C57BL6 mice

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Abstract

Brown algae have been considered a potential source of bioactives and used as a dietary supplement to manage obesity and its associated health complications. However, its effective use is limited due to heavy metals and microbial contamination, unawareness of health benefits and limited dietary exploitation. We developed, the Indian brown algae Padina tetrastromatica and barley-based anti-obesity food (AOF) and examined for microbial and heavy metal safety. Additionally, acute [0 (control), 50, 100, 200, 500 g AOF/kg diet] and sub-acute [0, 5, 50 g AOF/kg diet] doses of AOF were fed to C57BL6 mice and toxicity was examined. The physical, locomotory, hematological, biochemical parameters and histopathology were examined. Postprandial plasma and tissue levels of fucoxanthin and its metabolites were analyzed. Feeding AOF did not affect the general behavior, food and water intake, growth or survival of animals. Biochemical indices did not show any differences between AOF-fed and control groups. However, significantly lower levels of plasma cholesterol and triglycerides in groups fed 5 and 50 g of AOF/kg diet were observed. The post-mortem examination revealed no macroscopic/microscopic alteration in the vital organs. Overall, results validate that AOF is a safe and effective dietary supplement (even at higher doses of 500 g AOF/kg) to mitigate obesity.

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Abbreviations

AOF:

Anti-obesity food

LDL:

Low-density lipoproteins

HDL:

High-density lipoproteins

SGOT:

Aspartate aminotransferase

SGPT:

Alanine aminotransferase

ALP:

Alkaline phosphatase

CKMB:

Creatinine kinase-MB

LDH:

Lactate dehydrogenase

PCA:

Plate count agar

DRBC:

Dichloran rose Bengal chloramphenicol agar

VRBA:

Violet red bile agar

BP:

Braid parker agar

DS-LST:

Double strength-MUG lauryl sulphate

LB:

Lactose broth

EC:

Escherichia coli broth

RV:

Rappaport Vassiliadis

TT:

Tetrathionate broth

XLD:

Xylose lysine deoxycholate

HEA:

Hektoen enteric agar

BSA:

Bismuth sulphite agar

EMB:

Eosin methylene blue agar

TPC:

Total plate count

CFU:

Colony-forming unit

RBC:

Erythrocyte count

WBC:

White blood cells

HGB:

Hemoglobin

PVC:

Packed cell volume

MCH:

Mean corpuscular hemoglobin

MCHC:

Mean corpuscular hemoglobin concentration

PLT:

Platelets (thrombocytes) count

MCV:

Mean corpuscular volume

GC–MS:

Gas chromatography–mass spectroscopy

HPLC:

High-performance liquid chromatography

ICP-AES:

Inductively coupled plasma atomic emission spectrometer

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Funding

The Authors Priya Prakash Sharma and V. Baskaran acknowledge Science And Engineering Research Board, India (SERB) and Council of Scientific and industrial research (CSIR), New Delhi, Government of India [(SERB, No. EEQ/2016/000522 (VER-1) and 31/005(0592)/2020-EMR-I] for financial support and award of Senior Research fellow to Miss. Priya Prakash Sharma.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Biochemistry, CSIR-Central Food Technological Institute, Mysore, Karnataka, 570020, India

    Priya Prakash Sharma & Vallikannan Baskaran

  2. Food Safety and Analytical Quality Control Laboratory, CSIR-Central Food Technological Institute, Mysore, Karnataka, 570020, India

    V. Vanajakshi & Devendra Haware

Authors
  1. Priya Prakash Sharma
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  2. V. Vanajakshi
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  3. Devendra Haware
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  4. Vallikannan Baskaran
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Contributions

PPS: writing—original draft; writing—review and editing; data curation; formal analysis; investigation; methodology; validation; VV: data curation; formal analysis; DH: formal analysis, data validation; corresponding author BV: resources and conceptualization, validation, writing—reviewing and editing; supervision, visualization; supervision; project administration; conceptualization.

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Vallikannan Baskaran.

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Ethics approval

The animal experiment was conducted as per the strict accordance of the Committee for Control and Supervision of Experiments on Animals (CPCSEA) and Institutional Animal Ethics Committee (CFT/IAEC/121/2018) of CSIR-CFTRI guidelines for the care and use of laboratory animals.

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Sharma, P.P., Vanajakshi, V., Haware, D. et al. Brown algae and barley-based anti-obesity food and its safety in C57BL6 mice. J Food Sci Technol 59, 4230–4243 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s13197-022-05483-4

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s13197-022-05483-4

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