| Luo Han Kuo is a fruit of Siraitia grosvenorii plant which is a traditional Chinese herb and belongs to Cucurbitaceous plants. It contains sweet components called mogrosides, which are triterpene glycosides with 400 times sweeter than sucrose but with almost no calorie. Therefore, Luo Han Kuo is an ideal sweet additive. It has been reported that Luo Han Kuo mogrosides can scavenge free radicals and inhibit lipid peroxidation; however, these studies were restricted in vitro. So, in this paper, we systematically and comprehensively studied the effects of Luo Han Kuo concentrated juice (SE) and Luo Han Kuo mogrosides (SM) on antioxidation, lipid metabolism mediation and dental caries prevention in vivo, respectively. There were three parts as follows:(1). Evaluation of antioxidation. Hyperlipidemic ICR mice model was established by feeding high fat and high cholesterol diet to induce oxidative damage. The effects of SE (group SE) and SM (group SM) on the antioxidative enzymes in mouse serum and other antioxidative indexes were investigated. It has been shown that the activities of GSH-Px and CAT, contents of NO and T-AOC in hyperlipidemic model group (group M) were significantly lower (P<0.05), the level of MDA significantly higher (P<0.05), the activity of SOD wihout significant difference (P>0.05), compared with Control group (group C). However, compared with group M, the activities of GSH-Px, SOD and CAT of group SE and SM increased by 29.90% and 32.44%,15.53% and 19.03%, 28.63% and 29.93%, T-AOC and the contents of NO increased by 49.02% and 39.93%, 82.58% and 70.11% , the levels of MDA decreased by 40.83% and 31.10%, respectively, these differences were siginificant (P<0.05). It can be concluded that both SE and SM possess antioxidative ability.(2). Evaluation of lipid metabolism mediation. The functions of SE and SM in mediating lipid metabolism were carried out based on the hyperlipidemic ICR mice model. It was found that the levels of TC and TG of group M were 118.70mg/dl and 214.36mg/dl, the level of HDL-C was 54.99mg/dl.Compared with group M, the levels of TC of group SE and SM decreased by 17.32% and 27.49%, the levels of TG decreased by 28.37% and 44.49%, the levels of HDL-C increased by 34.41% and 27.30%, respectively, these differences were significant (P<0.05). It could be concluded that both SE and SM can positively mediate the lipid metabolism of hyperlipidemic mice, and more significant in SM.(3). Dental caries Prevention. The effects of SE and SM on the growing, fermenting and attaching of S.mutans in vitro as well as caries inducing and caries preventing in vivo were studied. The results indicated that the growth and attachment abilities of S.mutans in the medium containing SE were significantly lower than those of sucrose (P<0.05). S.mutans could not grow in the medium containing SM, which had no significant difference compared with that in the medium containing xylitol (P>0.05). The effects of SE in vivo on inducing caries were significantly lower than that of sucrose (P<0.05), the SM did not induce caries and possessed the activity of preventing caries when the mice were suffered from the caries inducing factors such as high sucrose diet and S.mutans.It is concluded that Luo Han Kuo has activities of antioxidation and lipid metabolism mediation. Its low cariogenicity would enlarge its application as a sweet additive. Furthermore, it was also found that Luo Han Kuo could induce the increase of the level of NO in mouse serum, which would show its new ability in preventing and curing the diseases caused by NO deficiency such as vasoconstriction and disorder of blood coagulation, but the mechanisms of these functions need to be further investigated.
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