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Antioxidant activity of extracts from in vitro

cultures of Salvia officinalis L. Food Chem
Article in Food Chemistry January 2007
Impact Factor: 3.39 DOI: 10.1016/j.foodchem.2006.12.003

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Food
Chemistry
Food Chemistry 104 (2007) 536541
www.elsevier.com/locate/foodchem

Antioxidant activity of extracts from in vitro cultures

of Salvia ocinalis L.
I. Grzegorczyk a,*, A. Matkowski b, H. Wysokinska a
b

a
Department of Biology and Pharmaceutical Botany, Medical University in Lodz, Muszynskiego 1, 90-151 Lodz, Poland
Department of Biology and Pharmaceutical Botany, Medical University in Wroclaw, Kochanowkiego 10, 51-601 Wroclaw, Poland

Received 8 August 2006; received in revised form 6 October 2006; accepted 11 December 2006

Abstract
Methanolic and acetone extracts from organ (shoots and hairy roots) and undierentiated (cell and callus) cultures of Salvia
ocinalis, as well as from shoots and roots of in vitro regenerated plants were evaluated for their antioxidant properties using three various in vitro models: scavenging of the free radicals using DPPH, transition metal reduction in phosphomolybdenum assay and inhibition of lipid oxidation. The concentrations of rosmarinic acid, diterpenoids (carnosic acid and carnosol) and total phenolic compounds in
each extract were determined. The methanolic hairy root and root regenerated plant extracts possessed the strongest eects on reducing
Mo and DPPH radical scavenging. On the other hand the best protective eect against linoleic acid oxidation was observed for acetone
extracts of shoots obtained from in vitro culture followed by the extracts of shoots of intact plants grown in the eld, without statistically
signicant dierences between them.
2006 Published by Elsevier Ltd.
Keywords: Antioxidant activity; Salvia ocinalis; In vitro cultures

1. Introduction
In recent years considerable attention has been devoted
to medicinal plants with antioxidant properties. The properties are commonly postulated to play an important role in
preventing diseases caused by oxidative stress, such as cancer, coronary arteriosclerosis, and the ageing processes
(Haraguchi, Saito, Okamura, & Yagi, 1995). There is much
literature concerning the antioxidant properties of many
species of genus Salvia. For example, Lamaison, PetitjeanFreytet, and Carnat (1990) investigated hydroalkoholic
extracts of several Salvia species for their 1,1-diphenyl-2picrylhydrazyl (DPPH) free radical scavenging activities.
Among them, Salvia ocinalis leaf extracts have been
shown to be the most active with eective dose (EC50) of
41 lg/ml, followed by Salvia sclarea (EC50 = 45 lg/ml),
Salvia triloba (EC50 = 50 lg/ml) and Salvia lavandulifolia
*

Corresponding author. Tel./fax: +48 426779160.

E-mail address: [email protected] (I. Grzegorczyk).

0308-8146/$ - see front matter 2006 Published by Elsevier Ltd.

doi:10.1016/j.foodchem.2006.12.003

(EC50 = 80 lg/ml). For its high antioxidant activity, S. ocinalis besides rosemary is widely used commercially in
foodstus (Ternes & Schwarz, 1995). There is evidence that
antioxidant properties of sage extracts are mainly attributed
to the abietane-type diterpenoids (carnosic acid and carnosol) and caeic acid derivatives (e.g., rosmarinic acid)
(Cuvelier, Berset, & Richard, 1994). Flavonoids and certain
components of essential oil are of less signicance (Lu &
Foo, 2001).
Biotechnological methods based on in vitro culture of
tissues and plants are considered to give the possibility of
producing standardized material, independent from environmental factors. The production of secondary metabolites in cultured in vitro plants can be increased by genetic
transformation with the soil-borne pathogen Agrobacterium rhizogenes. In earlier studies we have established protocols for the following systems for sage in vitro cultures:
cell and callus cultures, shoot and hairy root cultures and
in vitro propagated plants (Grzegorczyk, Bilichowski,
Mikiciuk-Olasik, & Wysokinska, 2005, 2006). We have

I. Grzegorczyk et al. / Food Chemistry 104 (2007) 536541

also shown that the tissues and plants produce compounds

with antioxidant activity (rosmarinic acid, carnosic acid
and carnosol) (Grzegorczyk et al., 2005).
In the present paper we evaluated the antioxidant capacities of acetone and methanolic extracts obtained from different in vitro cultures and in vitro propagated plants of
sage. Three dierent assays (DPPH free radical scavenging
activity, reduction of transition metal ions by of phosphomolybdenum complex and inhibition of lipid peroxidation)
were used. Antioxidant activities of the extracts from
in vitro cultures were compared with those of extracts of
S. ocinalis shoots and roots from plants obtained from
the seeds and grown in the eld. All extracts were chemically characterized by HPLC method in order to nd the
connection between their activity and chemical composition of extracts.

537

used. Identication of the plant was established by Prof.

J. Sicinski (Department of Plant Ecology and Phytosociology, University of odz).
2.2. Preparation of extracts
The dried and powdered materials tested (2 g, each)
were separately extracted with methanol (2  50 ml of boiling solvent for 2 h) or acetone (3  50 ml at room temperature for 15 min). Both methanolic and acetone extracts
were treated in the same way. The extracts were ltered
and the solvent was removed on a rotary evaporator at
40 C. The residues were dissolved in an appropriate volume of methanol to obtain 10 mg/ml concentration and
stored closed at 20 C until studied.
2.3. HPLC analysis

2. Material and methods

2.1. Plant material
For antioxidant assay the following plant materials of
S. ocinalis were used:
 callus and cell cultures (passage 17). Both cultures were
maintained on MS (Murashige & Skoog, 1962) medium
containing 0.1 mg/l NAA (a-naphthaleneacetic acid),
0.5 mg/l 2,4-D (2,4-dichlorophenoxyacetic acid),
0.2 mg/l BAP (6-benzylaminopurine). They were subcultured every 21 days (callus) or 14 days (suspension
culture);
 shoot culture (passage 18); it was cultured on MS agar
(0.7%) medium supplemented with 0.1 mg/l IAA
(indole-3-acetic acid), 0.45 mg/l BAP and subcultured
every 5 weeks;
 hairy root culture (passage 20) obtained after infection
of shoots with A. rhizogenes strain ATCC 15834. The
cultures were maintained in WP (Lloyd & McCown,
1980) liquid medium without growth regulators and
transferred routinely to fresh medium every 4 weeks.
The root culture was conrmed to be transformed by
PCR method (Grzegorczyk, Krolicka, & Wysokinska,
2006);
 shoots and roots of micropropagated plants after 10
weeks of growth in greenhouse.
The procedures for establishment of callus, cell suspension, shoot culture and hairy root culture as well as regeneration of S. ocinalis plantlets were described in our
previous works (Grzegorczyk et al., 2005, 2006). All sage
cultures tested were kept at 26 2 C under light conditions (40 lM m2 s1) with a photoperiod of 16 h light/
8 h dark.
For the comparison, shoots and roots of plants derived
from the same seeds as in vitro cultures and cultivated for
10 weeks in the experimental eld of the Department of
Pharmacognosy at the Medical University of odz were

Dried and powdered plant materials (250 mg) were

extracted with methanol or acetone as described above.
Acetone and methanolic extracts were analyzed by HPLC
on a Waters (Milford, USA) Symetry C18 column. The
details of the extraction procedure and HPLC analysis
were described in our previous work (Grzegorczyk et al.,
2005). CA, Car and RA were identied by comparing their
retention times and UV spectra with authentic samples
under the identical conditions. The amounts of the compounds were expressed in mg g1 of dry weight.
2.4. Antioxidant assays
2.4.1. DPPH radical scavenging
This experimental procedure was adopted from BrandWilliams, Cuvelier, and Berset (1995). The sage extracts
at dierent concentrations (2.5, 5.0, 12.5, 25.0, 50.0 and
250 lg/ml) were mixed with the same volume of 0.2 mM
methanolic solution of DPPH from Sigma. The disappearance of DPPH was read spectrophotometrically (the Shimadzu 1601 UV/VIS spectrophotometer, Shimadzu
Corp., Japan) at 517 nm immediately after mixing and
after 1, 5 and 30 min of incubation at room temperature.
Free radical scavenging capacity was calculated by the following equation:


Abs sample
% scavenging 100 
 100%
Abs DPPH
Abs sample = Abs measured  Abs control (i.e., absorbance of the sample tested without DPPH).
From the obtained values, the EC50 (dened as the concentration of sample at which 50% of maximum scavenging
activity was recorded) was calculated for each sample.
2.4.2. Phosphomolybdenum reduction
The method of Prieto, Pineda, and Aguilar (1999) was
used. Four hundred microlitres of the extract tested (at
the concentration of 50 lg/ml) was mixed with the reagent
solution (3.6 ml) containing ammonium molybdate

538

I. Grzegorczyk et al. / Food Chemistry 104 (2007) 536541

(4 mM), sodium phosphate (28 mM) and sulfuric acid

(600 mM). The reaction mixture was incubated in a water
bath shaker at 95 C for 90 min. After cooling at room
temperature the absorbance of the green phosphomolybdenum complex was measured at 695 nm against a blank. The
reducing capacity of extract was calculated using the following equation:

regression module of STATISTICA 5.0. Signicance of

treatment eects was determined using Duncans multiple
range at a 5% probability level (Statistica 5.0, Statsoft,
Poland).

Abs final Abs sample  Abs blank  Abs extract

3.1. General

Abs extract absorbance of sample where molybdate

solution was replaced by water;
Abs blank absorbance of blank containing methanol
(400 ll) instead of sage sample.

2.4.3. Linoleic acid peroxidation inhibition

The procedure was performed according to modied
method of Choi et al. (2002). The sage extract at the concentration of 100 lg/ml was mixed with 550 ll of linoleic
acid (40 lM), 500 ll of phosphate buer (100 lM, pH
7.4) and 150 ll of ascorbic acid (10 lM). Linoleic acid peroxidation was initiated by the addition of FeSO4. The reaction mixture was incubated for 60 min at 37 C. The
reaction was terminated by the addition of 1.5 ml of ice
cold 10% trichloroacetic acid (TCA) (Ubichem) in 0.5%
HCl. Then, 3 ml of TBA (Aldrich) in 50 mM NaOH was
added. The TBA/sample mixture was heated in the water
bath at 95 C for 60 min. After cooling down 3 ml aliquots
were taken from each sample and vortexed with equal volume of butanol, centrifuged at 450g for 30 min and the
upper colored layer was decanted to the spectrophotometric cuvettes. The absorbance was read at 532 nm and percentage of linoleic acid peroxidation inhibition was
calculated using the following equation:
% inhibition Abs control  Abs sample  Abs extract
 100=Abs control
Abs control includes ethanol instead of sage sample; Abs
extract absorbance of sample where linoleic acid solution
was replaced by ethanol.
2.5. Total phenolic determination
Total phenolic compound amount in extracts was determined by FolinCiocalteu method. The procedure of Singleton and Rossi (1965) has been used. The extracts at
the concentration of 100 lg/ml were added to the reaction
mixture (POCh, Gliwice, Poland) and the absorbance read
at 765 nm. The results are means of three repetitions
expressed in the form of gallic acid (GA) equivalents per
g of extract.
2.6. Statistical analysis
The estimated values are the means of three samples for
each plant material. EC50 was calculated using nonlinear

3. Results and discussion

The antioxidant eects of methanolic and acetone

extracts of various in vitro cultures of sage (callus, cell suspension, shoots and hairy roots) as well as shoots and roots
of in vitro propagated plants were measured. The activity of
the extracts was compared with that of methanolic and acetone extracts of sage plants obtained from seeds and grown
in the eld. For the chemical characterization, amounts of
the total phenolic compounds and the contents of carnosic
acid, carnosol and rosmarinic acid in all extracts were
determined (Table 1) (Fig. 1). These compounds are generally known to protect tissues and cells against various oxidative stresses (Haraguchi et al., 1995). Since the active
substances of plant extracts tested are dierent, the antioxidant activities of these extracts cannot be evaluated by
only a single method. Therefore, three dierent models
were used in this study.
3.2. DPPH radical scavenging
The radical scavenging activity was expressed as the percentage of reduction of the initial DPPH absorbance by the
extracts studied. EC50 values for these extracts were also
calculated (Table 2). The highest radical scavenging activity
was detected for RR methanolic extract (from roots of
in vitro regenerated sage plants) and HR methanolic extract
(from transformed roots grown in in vitro culture). The
free radicals amount in the test sample with these extracts
at the concentration of 50 lg/ml after 30 min incubation
decreased, respectively, by 94% and 88%. Their EC50 values
were 18.4 5.5 lg/ml and 20.4 4.2 lg/ml, respectively.
The values are comparable to EC50 for the synthetic antioxidant agent BHT (19.8 0.5 lg/ml) in the same test (Gulluce et al., 2003). The high antiradical activity of sage
untransformed (RR) and transformed (HR) root methanolic extracts might be explained by the presence of RA
(derivative of caeic acid with an orthohydroxybenzene
structure). It had been earlier reported that radical scavenging activity of plant extracts may be attributed to the compounds with catechol moieties (Lu & Foo, 2001). The
presence of RA is probably responsible for the inhibition
of DPPH by methanolic extract of undierentiated cell culture (LC) of S. ocinalis. From the estimated EC50 value it
could be seen that the extract exhibited almost half the
activity of the strongest RR methanolic extract. The antiradical activity of in vitro culture callus was not practically
observed (Table 2). The SF and SR shoot methanolic
extracts (from shoots of in vivo and in vitro regenerated
plants) were also good radical scavengers with DPPH inhi-

I. Grzegorczyk et al. / Food Chemistry 104 (2007) 536541

539

Table 1
Rosmarinic acid, carnosic acid and carnosol contents in various extracts of S. ocinalis
Plant material

Name

Extract

Compound contents (mg/g dry wt.)

RA

CA

Car

Shoot culture

SC

MeOH
AcO

12.3 0.1
Trace

2.75 0.02
4.37 0.22

0.50 0.07
0.88 0.02

Hairy root culture

HR

MeOH
AcO

30.9 1.0
Trace

n.d.
n.d.

n.d.
n.d.

Callus culture

CC

MeOH
AcO

15.8 0.2
Trace

n.d.
n.d.

n.d.
0.04 0.0004

Suspension culture

LC

MeOH
AcO

18.6 0.3
Trace

n.d.
n.d.

n.d.
0.05 0.0003

In vitro regenerated plants

Shoots

SR

MeOH
AcO

12.2 0.2
Trace

10.1 0.1
11.4 0.2

0.91 0.01
1.09 0.01

Roots

RR

MeOH
AcO

7.23 0.20
Trace

n.d.
0.07 0.01

n.d.
0.09 0.004

In vivo plants
Shoots

SF

MeOH
AcO

18.5 0.2
Trace

8.68 0.02
10.1 0.2

1.78 0.01
1.14 0.04

Roots

RF

MeOH
AcO

8.18 0.36
Trace

n.d.
n.d.

n.d.
0.07 0.002

GA equivalents in mg/g
extract

MeOH methanolic extracts, AcO acetone extracts.

n.d. not detected; Values are the means of three experiments standard error (SE).

100
80
60

MeOH

40

AcO

20
0
SF SR SA RF RR HR CC LC
Plant material

Fig. 1. The results of total phenols determination by the Folin-Ciocalteu

method expressed as gallic acid equivalents in mg per gram of extract.
MeOH methanolic extracts, AcO acetone extracts. The values are the
means SD. SF shoots in vivo grown plants, SR shoots in vitro
regenerated plants, SC shoot culture, RF roots in vivo grown plants,
SR roots in vitro regenerated plants, HR hairy root culture, CC callus
culture, LC suspension culture.

bition of 81% and 72%, respectively, at 50 lg/ml. The lowest scavenging activity (with EC50 values of 70.1 4.0)
exhibited SC (from shoot culture) methanolic extract. As
shown by HPLC all three analyzed compounds, i.e., RA,
CA and Car were identied in the methanolic shoot extracts
and their scavenging eects were related to their total content (Table 1).
The acetone extracts of sage were found to be less active
in DPPH system compared to the parallel methanolic
extracts. Among them, the strongest eect was observed
for shoot extracts in the following order: SF > SR > SC.

When the extracts were tested at the concentration of

50 lg/ml after 30 min of incubation, their capacity to
reduce DPPH radicals ranged between 25% and 40%
(Table 2). It should be also noticed that acetone extracts
of roots (RF, RR and HR) and in vitro cultures of undierentiated tissues (CC and LC), in which no peak of carnosic
acid or carnosol could be detected (or only trace of Car
were found) exhibited an evident scavenging eect only at
a very high concentration (250 lg/ml). These results as well
as the overall weaker action of shoot extracts rich in CA
and Car, in comparison to the root methanolic extracts
(HR, RR, RF) not containing these diterpenoids, suggest
the limited contribution of the abietanes to the DPPH
scavenging activity. Also RA is likely not the sole regulator
such activity. The better correlation with antiradical activity of sage extracts seems to have the total phenolic content
(Fig. 1). Therefore, the synergistic eect of RA and other
phenolics, such as salvianolic acid or/and avonoids might
be taken into account.
3.3. Phosphomolybdenum assay
The dierent sage extracts were also used to determine
their antioxidant capacities by the formation of green
phosphomolybdenum complex. The formation of the complex was measured by the intensity of absorbance in
extracts at the concentration of 50 lg/ml at 90 C. The
results indicate that under these conditions both methanolic and acetone extracts of sage are powerful antioxidants
(Fig. 2). However, the dierences in the degree of Mo

540

I. Grzegorczyk et al. / Food Chemistry 104 (2007) 536541

Table 2
DPPH radical scavenging activity of methanolic and acetone extracts of S. ocinalis
Plant material

MeOH extracts

AcO extracts

EC50

I (%)
SF
SR
SC
RF
RR
HR
CC
LC

B
a

81.4 0.8
72.3 2.2
39.2 0.04
69.8 0.6
94.3 4.0
88.1 3.0
23.8 1.0
57.6 0.4

23.2 3.3
39.6 6.6b
70.1 4.0c
32.5 4.1b
18.4 5.5a
20.4 4.2a
81.7 2.8d
34.1 2.7b

I (%)A

EC50B

39.6 2.8
29.5 0.2
24.3 1.9
3.16 0.87
5.38 0.36
14.3 0.1
5.70 1.04
14.3 0.2

62.5 8.5ce
61.8 9.1ce
142 8
>5000
>1000
169 1
>5000
178 1

MeOH methanolic extracts, AcO acetone extracts.

The means with the same letter do not dier statistically according to Duncans multiple range test (p 6 0.05).
SF shoots in vivo grown plants, SR shoots in vitro regenerated plants, SC shoot culture, RF roots in vivo grown plants, SR roots in vitro
regenerated plants, HR hairy root culture, CC callus culture, LC suspension culture.
A
Percentage of inhibition at 50 lg/ml; 30 min of incubation. The values are the means standard deviation (SD).
B
EC50 the concentration of sample (lg/ml) showing 50% of maximal DPPH radical scavenging activity. The values are the means SE.

reduction between two types of extracts (methanolic and

acetone) were observed. Similarly as in DPPH assay, methanol was a more ecient solvent to extract antioxidants
from sage roots (RF, RR and HR extracts) compared to
acetone. Mo reduction capacity of root methanolic extracts
seems to depend mainly on their RA content. Thus, methanolic extract of hairy roots with highest amount of RA
was also characterized by the greatest reducing potential
(Fig. 2). However, the acetone extracts of shoots (SF, SC
and SR), in which carnosic acid and carnosol were found,
showed quite similar reducing capacities as the shoot methanolic extracts containing RA in addition to diterpenoids.
It is likely that carnosic acid and carnosol are more important factors at work in this assay than they were in the
DPPH scavenging assay.

0.7

The inhibition of hydroxyl radical-induced linoleic acid

peroxidation (LPO) by various sage extracts was assayed
by the TBARS test. In this system, the oxidation activity
was dierent when compared to the results of DPPH scavenging model. In LPO method, shoot acetone extracts (SF,
SR and SC) showed the highest activity with inhibitory
eect of 7078% at a concentration of 100 lg/ml (Fig. 3).
The acetone extracts contained higher amount of carnosic
acid compared to the other extracts tested. It suggests that
the diterpenoid has the greatest participation in lipid
protection. Methanolic extracts of the shoots resulted in
5356% linoleic acid peroxidation inhibition. Methanolic
extracts of sage roots (RR, HR and RF) with rosmarinic
acid as the main compound showed a similar inhibitory
eect (4856%) (Table 1). The acetone extracts of sage
roots and undierentiated callus and cell cultures of S. ocinalis indicated weak activity. These extracts contained
only a trace of abietane diterpenoids (Table 1). The higher
ability of the less polar compounds extracted by acetone to

0.5
0.4

MeOH

0.3

AcO

0.2
0.1
0
SF

SR SC RF RR HR CC LC
Plant material

Fig. 2. The reducing power (expressed as absorbance units) of dierent S.

ocinalis methanolic and acetone extracts in phosphomolybdenum assay
at the extract concentration of 50 lg/ml in incubation temperature: 90 C.
MeOH methanolic extracts, AcO acetone extracts. The values are the
means SD. SF shoots in vivo grown plants, SR shoots in vitro
regenerated plants, SC shoot culture, RF roots in vivo grown plants,
SR roots in vitro regenerated plants, HR hairy root culture, CC callus
culture, LC suspension culture.

% inhibition of linoleic acid

peroxidation

Absorbance units

0.6

3.4. Linoleic acid peroxidation

100
80
60

MeOH
AcO

40
20
0
SF

SR

SC

RF

RR

HR

CC

LC

Plant material

Fig. 3. Inhibition of linoleic acid peroxidation by S. ocinalis methanolic

and acetone extracts at the concentration of 100 lg/ml in the Fe/AA
system using TBARS detection. MeOH methanolic extracts, AcO
acetone extracts; The values are the means SD. SF shoots in vivo
grown plants, SR shoots in vitro regenerated plants, SC shoot culture,
RF roots in vivo grown plants, SR roots in vitro regenerated plants, HR
hairy root culture, CC callus culture, LC suspension culture.

I. Grzegorczyk et al. / Food Chemistry 104 (2007) 536541

interact directly with the fatty acid molecules may account

for the better eciency of these extracts in breaking the free
radical propagation chain reaction (Halliwell & Gutteridge, 1999). The lower activity of methanolic extracts
despite the higher content of RA, in addition to the diterpenoids in case of shoots, is hard to interpret with the present data.
4. Conclusions
The results of our work showed antioxidant eects of
S. ocinalis extracts. Such properties have been previously reported for leaf extracts of the plant (Lamaison
et al., 1990). We found that also extracts of sage roots
exhibited strong antioxidant activity. It was observed that
due to variety of antioxidant compounds presented in
sage, the activity of the extracts was attributed to the
assay method and the method of sample extraction (e.g.,
the polarity of solvent used for sample extraction). For
example, less polar acetone extracts characterized mainly
by the presence of carnosic acid and carnosol showed
strong activity in LPO method, whereas they exhibited
less DPPH radical scavenging properties. On the other
hand, the antioxidant properties measured by DPPH
method were greater in polar fractions, i.e., methanolic
extracts, containing both diterpenoids and rosmarinic
acid. Attempts to correlate the observed antioxidant activity with chemical nature or content of compounds in the
extracts did not reveal direct association between the two
parameters. Matsingou, Petrakis, Kapsokefalou, and Salifoglou (2003) have reported that dierences in antioxidant properties of plant in dierent biological system
may be attributed to the presence of dierent substrates
as well as to the variable nature of product generated
by the reaction system.
The main nding of this work is the fact that extracts of
sage organ cultures, especially hairy roots, obtained as a
result of transformation through A. rhizogenes possessed
a high antioxidant activity comparable to or even higher
than that of extracts of shoots and roots of eld-collected
S. ocinalis. With respect to this, it is possible to consider
the culture as a potential source of natural antioxidants.
An attraction of transformed roots is their biochemical
and genetic stability and relatively rapid growth in the
absence of exogenous growth regulators. They are also
suitable for bioreactor systems. As expected, the extracts
of undierentiated callus and cell cultures of sage proved
to be less active in all methods tested. It is accepted that
the dedierentiation of plant tissues during establishment
of callus and cell cultures is often connected with reduction
of content of secondary metabolites.

541

Acknowledgements
This work was supported by grant 092/P05/2003.
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