Natural antioxidants of the Jaffna variety of Moringa Oleifera seed oil of Indian origin as compared to other vegetable oils

摘要

The Moringa oleifera crop is grown ail over India for its nutritious pods, leaves and seeds. M oleifera seeds are endowed with a high oil content (～39%) which resembles olive oil because of its high oleic acid content. (～65-75%). The objective of the present study was to evaluate the natural antioxidants of crude seed kernel oil from the Jaffna variety of M. oleifera (MSO). Natural antioxidants like tocopherols and phenolics as well as minor compounds such as sterols and carotenoids present in MSO and its radical scavenging activity were measured in comparison to dried coconut kernel (copra) crude oil (CNO), crude sesame oil (SESO), crude niger seed oil (NSO), crude palm oil (CPO), crude rice bran oil (RBO) and commercially refined groundnut oil (GNO). MSO contained 88 ppm of total tocopherols with α-tocopherol (56.2 ppm) being the major tocopherol. MSO also contained 117.9 ppm of total phenolics with gallic acid (48.5 ppm) being the major phenolic. MSO contained fair amounts of sterols (1700.8 ppm) and carotenoids (17.9 ppm). MSO showed an IC_(50) value of 35.5 mg mL~(-1). This study indicates that MSO has antioxidant characteristics which are better than GNO and comparable to those of GNO.