Industrial Crops and Products 61 (2014) 438–441 Contents lists available at ScienceDirect Industrial Crops and Products jo u r n al homep age: www.elsevier.com/locate/indcrop HPLC–DAD analysis of phenolic compounds and antioxidant properties of Asphodeline lutea roots from Bulgaria and Turkey Irına Lazarova a , Gokhan Zengin b,∗ , Abdurrahman Aktumsek b , Reneta Gevrenova c , Ramazan Ceylan b , Sengul Uysal b a Deparment of Chemistry, Faculty of Pharmacy, Medical University of Sofia, Bulgaria b Deparment of Biology, Faculty of Science, Selcuk University, Konya, Turkey c Department of Pharmacognosy, Faculty of Pharmacy, Medical University of Sofia, Bulgaria a r t i c l e i n f o Article history: Received 11 April 2014 Received in revised form 24 July 2014 Accepted 25 July 2014 Keywords: Asphodeline lutea Phenolics Free radical scavenging Bulgaria Turkey a b s t r a c t Asphodeline lutea (L.) Rchb. is a wild edible plant, traditionally consumed in the Mediterranean diet, but there are limited literature data about its medicinal properties. Methanol extracts of A. lutea roots from Bulgarian (ALB) and Turkish (ALT) origin were evaluated for their antioxidant activity using various in vitro models: phosphomolybdenum assay, free radical scavenging activity, metal chelating activity and ferric and cupric reducing power. Both methanolic extracts were analyzed for phenolic derivatives by HPLC–DAD. Caffeic acid was the dominant phenolic acid being present up to 2.19 ± 0.020 mg/g extract in ALB. The highest content of (+) catechin (1.54 ± 0.060 mg/g) and (-) epicatechin (3.18 ± 0.160 mg/g) was found in ALB as well as total polyphenolics (22.45 ± 0.95 mg/g GAEs/g extract). The ALT revealed the highest total flavonoid content (34.99 ± 0.39 mg REs/g extract). Free radical scavenging activity of ALB against DPPH (25.39 ± 0.36 mg TEs/g extract) and ABTS (33.99 ± 1.06 mg TEs/g) was evaluated. In addition, ALB had stronger metal chelating activity (7.31 ± 0.31 mg EDTAEs/g extract) and higher ferric (34.67 ± 0.51 mg TEs/g extract) and cupric (23.82 ± 0.36 mg TEs/g) reduction ability as compared with the ALT. Total antioxidant capacity of ALB in phosphomolybdenum test was assayed (236.80 ± 0.86 mg AEs/g extract). A. lutea roots have a significant potential in safeguarding against various induced oxidative stress. © 2014 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved. 1. Introduction Phenolic compounds, one of the most widely occurring groups in plants, are an essential part of the human diet, because of their broad range of biological properties. These secondary metabolites are well known as powerful natural antioxidants with free radi- cal scavenging activity that has great relevance in the prevention and therapeutics of diseases in which oxidants or free radicals are implicated (Vinson et al., 1995). Living organisms are continuously threatened by the damage caused by free radicals, especially reactive oxygen species (ROS) which are produced during electron transport chain in normal oxygen metabolism or are induced by exogenous damage such as smoking, UV and pollution. The natural antioxidants gain advan- tage over the synthetic antioxidants because of their less or no toxicity (Barlow and Schlatter, 2010). Therefore, the scientists ∗ Corresponding author. Tel.: +90 332 223 27 81; fax: +90 332 2410106. E-mail address: gokhanzengin@selcuk.edu.tr (G. Zengin). constantly address their attention to new plant sources offering functional efficacy. The genus Asphodeline Rchb. (Liliaceae) is represented by 14 species distributed in the Mediterranean area (Ulubelen and Tuzlaci, 1985). Three plant species – Asphodeline lutea, A. liburnica and A. taurica occur in Bulgaria (Valev, 1964). The genus Asphodeline is presented in Turkey by 20 taxa of which 11 are endemic. Because of the high endemism ratio, Turkey is the main gene center for Asphodeline (Tuzlaci, 1987). The edible use of its roots, shoots, flow- ers, and leaves has been known for a long time (Todorova-Nikolova et al., 2010). Several Asphodeline species are consumed in salads in different regions of Turkey and their leaves are characterized in general by a good nutritional quality (Zengin et al., 2012). Previous investigation of the A. lutea roots led to the isolation of two new anthraquinones for the genus Asphodeline, 1,5,8- trihydroxy-3-methylanthraquinone and 1-hydroxy-8-methoxy-3 methylanthraquinone, as well as the known chrysophanol, asphodeline and 1,1 ′ ,8,8 ′ ,10-pentahydroxy-3,3 ′ -dimethyl-10,7 ′ - bianthracene-9,9 ′ ,10 ′ -trione (Todorova-Nikolova et al., 2010). Naphthalenes and naphthoquinones were isolated for the first time http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.indcrop.2014.07.044 0926-6690/© 2014 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.