Pharmacophore an International Research Journal
Pomegranate (Punica granatum L.) belonging to the Lythraceae family is commonly known as Rommane (Arabe). It is an edible fruit, cultivated in Algeria country for its interests as a nutritional and medicinal product useful for treating a wide range of health maladies. The present work focuses to evaluate the phenolic composition and antioxidant activity of hydroethanolic extract of peel part of this fruit. The phenolic extract of the dried and powdered pomegranate peel was obtained by conventional maceration using 70% ethanol in water as solvent. The extraction yield was 39.72%. Quantitative determination of total phenolic, flavonoid and condensed tannin contents was carried out using colorimetric methods, its amounts were found to be 158.18± 0.66 mg GAE/ g DW, 85.74± 9.77 mg RE/ g DW and 08.98± 0.90 mg CE/ g DW, respectively. The evaluation of antioxidant capacity using phosphomolybdate (PM), 2.2-diphenyl-1-picrylhydrazyl (DPPH) and 2,2'-Azino-bis (3-ethylbenzothiazoline-6-sulfonic acid) diammonium salt (ABTS) tests showed that the pomegranate peel extract had a good overall antioxidant potential of 23.53± 1.49 mg AAE/ g DW and showed a concentration-dependent in scavenging activity against DPPH and ABTS free radicals, with an efficient EC50 values of 4.64± 0.35 and 3.63± 0.07 µg/ml, respectively. The present findings thus give authority to the fact that pomegranate peel powder could be efficiently used as a potential source of natural antioxidants to prevent damage associated with free radicals.
