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Mangoes: how useful in immunity?

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eMediNexus    05 August 2021

Fruits, immunity and COVID

Mango fruits are rich in phytochemicals and possess a high nutritional value due to their high content of polyphenolics and vitamins. This fruit is loaded with antioxidant, anti-inflammatory, anti-cancer properties etc which has been even described in literature from the past. So this fruit should find a place in everyone’s diet for its multifaceted biochemical actions and health-enhancing properties.

Traditional medicine utilizes the different parts of the mango tree (fruit pulps, extracts of fruit kernel, leaves, and stem bark) for their health properties.  Mango pulp is loaded with polyphenolic compounds like Mangiferin, gallic acids (m-digallic and m-trigallic acids), gallotannins, quercetin, isoquercetin, ellagic acid, and β-glucogallin which acts meticulously to cure many diseases. It has been estimated that the mango pulp contains about 6.9 mg/kg of gallic acid and 4.4 mg/kg of mangiferin. Mangiferin has been proved for its great medicinal value.  

Antioxidant Properties of Mangifera indica L. (Mango)-

The mango plant contains a large variety of antioxidants, pigments, and vitamins in any parts, are responsible for the antioxidant and free radical scavenging activities. Mangiferin (present in mango) is the most potent antioxidant known; they are thought to be more potent than both vitamin C and vitamin E and thus are sometimes referred to as “super antioxidants.”

Mangiferin is capable of specifically protecting against free radical production by the Fenton reaction due to its iron-chelating properties.

A study found that exocarp, mesocarp, and endocarp of mango can efficaciously counteract oxidative damage caused by ROS. This can further be utilized in the treatment of Covid-19, which too shows oxidative load in the patients body.

Anti-Inflammatory Effects of Mango-

Several studies have demonstrated the anti-inflammatory role of phytochemicals, contained in mango, in several chronic pathological disorders associated with inflammatory responses. Example disorders like Inflammatory bowel diseases, primarily including ulcerative colitis, are characterised by chronic inflammation and mucosal damage in the large intestine.

Mango extracts have also shown anti-inflammatory activity in experimental murine models of ulcerative colitis. The treatment with an aqueous stem bark extract from Mangifera indica, containing a mixture of polyphenols and flavonoids, reduced the colitis symptoms, like body weight loss, colon shortening, and diarrhoea. Further, they also attenuated the levels of iNOS, COX-2, TNF-α, and TNFR-2 expression in colonic tissue, and decreased IL-6 and TNF-α serum levels.

Another study on mango beverage demonstrated a reduction in the inflammatory response associated with dextran sodium sulfate-induced colitis in mice by inhibiting the IGF1R/AKT/mTOR pathway. This effect was assumed to be due to gallic acid, the most prevalent polyphenol of mango mesocarp.

The anti-inflammatory effect of mango can be thus incorporated in treating the patients with Covid-19, who also demonstrate a wide range of inflammation in the body.

Gastro-protective effects of Mango-

There is a large amount of evidence that supports the gastro-protective effects of mango. A study demonstrated that a mango leaf decoction attenuated the gastric damage induced by HCl/ethanol in mice. This effect may be related to mangiferin and benzophenone glycoside, the main bioactive molecules present in the leaf decoction of mango. Yet another study reported that mangiferin mitigates gastric ulcers in ischemia/reperfused rats via inducing the expression of Nrf2, heme oxygenase and PPAR-γ (peroxisome proliferator-activated receptor gamma).

Anti-diabetic effects of Mango

The mango exocarp extracts show an anti-diabetic effect, probably due to their ability to inhibit α-amylase and α-glucosidase, the carbohydrate hydrolysing enzymes. The presence of polyphenolic acids, like gallic acid, chlorogenic acid, and ferulic acid, in the mango is known to demonstrate these effects.

Anticancer Effects of Mango-

Mango has also been studied widely for its anti-cancerous effects. A study reported that an ethanolic extract of mango kernel is able to induce cell death in both oestrogen-positive and -negative breast cancer cell lines, sparing the normal breast cells. This cytotoxic effect of mango kernel extract in oestrogen-negative breast tumour cells is related to the production of ROS, which promotes apoptosis via Bax activation and cytochrome c release. 

The gallic acid and gallotannin-rich mango extracts have been shown to exert antitumor effects in BT474 breast cancer cells and athymic mice bearing BT474 cells as xenografts through suppression of the PI3K/Akt/mTOR pathway.

A study also revealed that the mango fruits from tropical areas can efficaciously exert an anti-proliferative action on human colon cancer cell lines. 

Many reports have also demonstrated the beneficial properties of mangoes in Age-related macular degeneration, Heart diseases, Skin and hair, eyes, digestion, ageing, weight loss etc. 

Thus they open a wide arena for further research and implication of their beneficial properties to a wide range of diseases.

Source-

Lauricella M, Emanuele S, Calvaruso G, Giuliano M, D′Anneo A. Multifaceted Health Benefits of Mangifera indica L. (Mango): The Inestimable Value of Orchards Recently Planted in Sicilian Rural Areas. Nutrients. 2017;9(5):525. Published 2017 May 20. doi:10.3390/nu9050525

Gelabert-Rebato M, Wiebe JC, Martin-Rincon M, Gericke N, Perez-Valera M, Curtelin D, Galvan-Alvarez V, Lopez-Rios L, Morales-Alamo D, Calbet JAL. Mangifera indica L. Leaf Extract in Combination With Luteolin or Quercetin Enhances VO2peak and Peak Power Output, and Preserves Skeletal Muscle Function During Ischemia-Reperfusion in Humans, Frontiers in Physiology, 2018;9:740.    DOI=10.3389/fphys.2018.00740  

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