Blue Medicine Water Lily (nymphaea Stellata Willd) Polyphenol Activity And Genotoxicity Evaluation

Nymphaea Stellata willd. flowers were explored to evaluate their antioxidant, tyrosinase andα-glucosidase inhibitory properties in vitro assay. The methanol extract from N. stellata flowers enriched in polyphenols shows higher ABTS radical scavenging activity than Trolox, a standard antioxidant. In tyrosinase assay, this extract exhibited the potency on both diphenolase and monophenolase activities. Furthermore, this extract was found to show the potentα-glucosidase inhibition on maltose-hydrolyzing activity and show low activity against rat intestinal sucrase and porcine pancreaticα-amylase. The toxicology and safety of N. stellata flowers extract was evaluated by in vitro (Ames, chromosomal aberration), and in vivo toxicity tests (acute toxicity in Wistar rats and micronucleus assay in ICR mice). No mutagenicity of this extract was observed in the absence and presence of metabolic activation up to precipitating concentrations of 5000μg/plate (Ames test) or 5000μg/ml (chromosome aberration test). The acute oral toxicity study revealed no significant findings at 10000 mg N. stellata flowers extract /kg body weight, and in the micronucleus test N. stellata flowers extract was negative. Hence, these tests demonstrated that this extract is safe and does not cause any genotoxicity under the conditions investigated in this study. From these results, we can conclude that N. stellata could be useful in functional foods, medicines and cosmetics as a natural resource because of its potency of antioxidant, depigmention and antidiabetic biological activities and safety.