Natural immunity boosters: Clinical trial reports

Background 

Natural phytoconstituents are present in the different vegetables, fruits; plant extracts which provide significant nutrition to develop the immunity of a human body. In today’s modern life, man is so busy that he has no time to have balanced and nutritious food, resulting in low immunity and increasing the chances of different infections. Several health drinks in today’s fast-moving lifestyle are acting as substitutes and helping in boosting immunity. Mulmina® Mango is one such health drink, which is rich in immune-boosting and antioxidant properties. These pharmacological activities are due to the presence of active ingredients such as mangiferin, triterpenoid, saponins such as asiaticoside, brahmoside, asiatic acid and Brahmic acid of Centella asiatica and curcuminoids from turmeric. Hence a quantitative analysis of these active constituents in Mulmina® Mango becomes necessary. So a study was done to ascertain and assess the amount of mangiferin, beta carotene, asiatic acid and curcumin in Mulmina® Mango. 

Label claim of Mulmina® Mango (Each 200 mL of Mulmina® Mango) contains 

• Amra – Mango fruit pulp: 32 g
• Mandukaparni w. p. extract: 40 mg
• Haridra – turmeric powder: 100 mg

Study design and Method ²

• Shimadzu high-performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) system (with PDA detector) and Lab solutions software was used to develop a robust method for the estimation of mangiferin, beta carotene, asiatic acid and curcumin .
• Confirmation was done related to sensitivity, accurateness, precision and reproducibility of the method.
• Quantification of the active components of Mulmina® Mango was done by analyzing six different batches of Mulmina® Mango (MMA-320, MMA-298 and MMAB-124, MMAC163, MMAC 164 and; MMAC 165) by HPLC.
• One-way ANOVA was used to statistically analyze the significant difference in the average concentration of active constituents across three different batches of Mulmina® Mango. p-value was found to be higher than ≥0.05 (insignificant if, p<0.05).

Results ²

• The developed HPLC method successfully analyzed the samples.
• The concentration of mangiferin, beta carotene, asiatic acid and curcumin in six different batches (MMA-298, MMAB-124, MMAB-320, MMAC 163, MMAC 164, and MMAC 165) of Mulmina® Mango juice are given in Table 1 .3
• The number of samples taken for analysis was 3 from each batch.

Table 1: Concentrations of mangiferin, beta carotene, asiatic acid and curcumin in six different batches of Mulmina® Mango

Discussion:

Mangiferin shows antioxidant properties by protecting against oxidative stress and by significantly increasing levels of SOD, GSH, CAT, GST, and quenching free radicals. It also has anti-inflammatory properties, reduces mortality and acute lung injury (ALI).³

The triterpene glycosides present in Centella asiatica exhibit antioxidant effects. The Learning and memory were assessed in the mice model using Morris Water Maze (MWM) and then tissue was collected and gene expression analyzed. The study showed that the water extract of Centella asiatica (CAW) exhibited strong antioxidant activity and indicated a cognitive enhancing effect in healthy mice, improved performance in the MWM in aged animals and had a modest effect on the performance of young animals. The CAW also showed changes in the gene expression which indicated a possible effect on mitochondrial biogenesis, which in conjunction with activation of antioxidant response genes could contribute to cognitive improvement.⁴

Minor variation in the concentration of active constituents was observed in the present HPLC analysis. This may be due to the seasonal and geographical variations of plantations. Mulmina® Mango is a good quality product with excellent efficacy.

Conclusion

Thus, the quantitative assessment of Mulmina® Mango showed that Mulmina® Mango tetra pack contains good amount of mangiferin, beta carotene and curcumin which have strong antioxidant, anti-inflammatory and stress relieving properties and can serve as a potent health drink to boost the immunity.

References:

1. Adrianne Bendich. Physiological Role of Antioxidants in the Immune System. Journal of Dairy Science, 1993, Volume 76, Issue 9, , 2789-2794.
2. Mulmina, Scientific updates,Update-1, 1-64.
3. Muhammad Imran, M. S. A., Masood Sadiq Butt, Joong-Ho Kwon, Muhammad Umair Arshad,4 and Muhammad Tauseef Sultan. Mangiferin: a natural miracle bioactive compound against lifestyle related disorders, Lipids Health Dis. 2017, 16: 84., 1-17
4. Gray NE, Harris CJ, Quinn JF, Soumyanath A. Centella asiatica modulates antioxidant and mitochondrial pathways and improves cognitive function in mice. Journal of ethnopharmacology. 2016;180:78-86.