QUANTITATIVE ESTIAMATION OF PHYTOCHEMICALS AND ANTIOXIDANT ACTIVITIES OF FRESH WHEATGRASS (Triticum aestivum) AND WHEATGRASS POWDER

Abstract

Wheatgrass belongs to the poaceae family has been traditionally used, since ancient times, to treat various diseases and disorders. Wheatgrass can be taken in various forms like powder, juice, capsules, pills etc. This study focused on the presence or absence of phytochemicals of fresh wheatgrass and dried wheatgrass powder on two different solvent extracts (methanol and ethanol). Furthermore present study also investigated the quantitative determination of phytochemicals and antioxidant activities of fresh wheatgrass, dried wheatgrass powder and fresh wheatgrass juice. Ethanolic extract of fresh wheatgrass showed significantly (p<0.05) higher total phenolic content (42.09 ± 4.73) mg GAE/g than methanolic extract (37.56 ± 2.44) mg GAE/g of fresh weight. Both solvent extracts showed an appreciable amount of phenolic contents present in fresh sample. It was also observed that in both extracts total flavonoids content for wheatgrass powder sample was almost similar (4.97 ± 2.15) and (4.97 ± 1.42) mg QE/g of powder respectively. Due to heat treatment of dried powder in both solvent extracts DPPH inhibition activity was lower than fresh sample extracts. Ferric Reducing Antioxidant Power (FRAP) was higher in methanolic extracts for both fresh wheatgrass and dried wheatgrass powder than in ethanolic extracts significantly (p<0.05). Total phenolic contents, DPPH inhibition activity and Ferric Reducing Antioxidant Power (FRAP) (194.64 ± 3.58) mg GAE/100 ml, (27.45 ± 0.93) % and (13.15 ± 0.79) mg FeSO4.7H2O/ml were observed in fresh wheatgrass juice respectively. Chlorophyll, an active metabolic agent was found in all samples and fresh wheatgrass juice also known as “Green Blood” contained total chlorophyll (1.30 ± 0.04) mg/ml of juice. These findings indicated that wheatgrass contains important bioactive compounds. Therefore wheatgrass can be taken as an important diet source in the form of various products which have significant potential to be used in traditional medicine system for the treatment of various diseases as well as for all persons.