Phenolic Acids, Flavonoid Profile and Antioxidant Activity in Mangosteen (Garcinia Mangostana L.) Pericarp.

Plants contain natural antioxidant constituents such as phenolic compounds, which
have attracted a great deal of public and scientific interest because of their healthpromoting
effects as antioxidants.A high-performance liquid chromatography procedure
for separating 15 polyphenols was used for the determination of phenolic
acids and flavonoids in the pericarp of the mangosteen fruit. Sequential hydrolysis of
the pericarp showed that phenolic acids can be released by hydrolyzing the mangosteen
pericarp under basic or acidic conditions; however, the former was more efficient
in the release of phenolic acids than the latter.The base hydrolyzed fraction also
showed to be the most potent antioxidant and free radical scavenger compared with
acid hydrolyzed fraction or unhydrolyzed fraction, which may be accounted for the
high polyphenolic content. The outcome of this study shows that mangosteen fruit pericarp extracts contain
phenolic acids, which are believed to be effective nutrients in the prevention of oxidative
stress. This experiment also proved that simple high-performance liquid
chromatography offers a very good alternative for identification of phenolic compounds
instead of silyl derivatization. The mass spectrometry of the phenolic compounds
is used together with the aforementioned technique as amore sensitive, easy
method to detect and study the compositional profile of the extracts as well as the
structure and functional relationship of the components.