Antioxidant activity and total phenolic content of earthworm paste of Lumbricus rubellus (red worm) and Eudrilus eugenia (African night crawler)

Abstract

Earthworm paste (EP) has many therapeutic properties such as antioxidant, anti-inflammatory, anticancer and antibacterial activities. Antioxidant properties of the earthworm paste extract may attribute to high phenolic compounds. This study involved quantification of phenolic compounds and evaluation of the antioxidant activity of earthworm paste (EP) from Lumbricus rubellus (red worm) and Eudrilus eugeniae (African night crawler). Three types of solvents were used: 75% methanol, 80% methanol and 80% ethanol. Total phenolic compounds were quantified spectrophotometrically using Folin-Ciocalteu reagent. The antioxidant activity of earthworms paste was evaluated using DPPH (1,1-diphenyl-1-2-picrylhydrazl) method. The extraction of phenolics with 80% ethanol in both species yielded the highest amount of phenolics, 220.6 mg/L, in the African night crawler extract and 247.00 mg/L in the red worm extract. Extraction with 80% methanol yielded 217.00 mg/L of phenolics in the African night crawler extract and 228.00 mg/L in the red worm extract. Extraction with 75% methanol yielded higher amounts in red worm (237.00 mg/L) than in African night crawler (207.00 mg/L). EP of the African night crawler yielded a greater amount of phenolic compounds than the red worm. DPPH assay showed that the inhibition activity of African night crawler (95.23%) was significantly higher than that of the red worm extract (38.26%) in 80% methanol, whereas, in 80% ethanol, the inhibition activity of African night crawler (48.13%) was not significantly different from that of the red worm extract (47.73%). Inhibition of antioxidant activity of African night crawler extract in 75% methanol (48.13%) was higher than that of the red worm extract (47.93%). The study showed that earthworm paste has notable amounts of phenolic compounds that have significant antioxidant activity.

Antioxidant Enzyme Activity and Lipid Peroxidation in Aporrectodea caliginosa Earthworms Exposed to Silver Nanoparticles and Silver Nitrate in Spiked Soil

“…We believe the addition of antiproteases may have prevented enzyme degradation and hence contributed to higher enzyme activities even when expressed as a fraction of the protein concentration. This is an important finding and may explain the differences in antioxidant enzyme activities and LPO between the present study and those reported by others (Pan et al 2010; Aldarraji et al 2013; Muthu and Durairaj 2015).…”

Evaluation of Antioxidant Acitivity of Eisenia Fetida

“…Calculation of phenolic content is done by applying the formula: Ethanol as solvent extracted phenolic content from the coelomic fluid of the Eisenia fetida was significant. The highest concentration (Aldarraji et al, 2013) was taken for coelomic fluid total phenolic content and findings from the yields justify the work done by many scientists (Pinelo et al, 2004;Spigno et al, 2007;Turkmen et al, 2007). Solubility of phenolic compounds were found higher in ethanol.…”

Evaluating Strategies to Control Enzymatic Browning of Minimally Processed Yacon (Smallanthus sonchifolius)

“…In general, the average content of phenols found for yacon in this study was elevated (4.2 ± 1.48 mg GAE per g of yacon), higher than those found by Valentová and Ulrichová (2003) and Lachman et al (2004) who obtained approximately 2 mg g −1 fresh cut yacon, but it is worth to mention that the classical methodology applied to assess the phenol concentrations can lead to overestimated results. Folin-Ciocalteu spectrophotometric method is the most commonly used; however, it is not specific, because the reaction on which this method is based on involves all of the phenolic groups in the media, as well as other reducer substances added or naturally present in food, such as ascorbic acid, sugars, and a few amino acids (Naczk and Shahidi 2004;Ronald et al 2005;Zhao et al 2006;Aldarraji et al 2013).…”