Impact of low and high molecular weight oat beta-glucan on oxidative stress and antioxidant defense in spleen of rats with LPS induced enteritis Katarzyna Blaszczyk a , Jacek Wilczak b , Joanna Harasym c, * , Sylwia Gudej a , Dominika Suchecka a , Tomasz Kr  olikowski a , Ewa Lange a , Joanna Gromadzka-Ostrowska a a Chair of Nutritional Physiology, Department of Dietetics, Faculty of Human Nutrition and Consumer Sciences, Warsaw University of Life Sciences (SGGW), Poland b Division of Dietetics, Department of Physiological Sciences, Faculty of Veterinary Medicine, Warsaw University of Life Sciences (SGGW), Poland c Food Biotechnology Department, Institute of Chemistry and Food Technology, Faculty of Engineering and Economics, Wroclaw University of Economics, Poland article info Article history: Received 21 February 2015 Received in revised form 26 April 2015 Accepted 14 May 2015 Available online 27 May 2015 Keywords: Spleen Lipid oxidation Glutathione reductase Superoxide dismutase Rats Oat eta-glucan abstract Food hydrocolloids impact on human health is usually associated with positive interaction within gastrointestinal track and connected immune response. One of the most underestimated organs which reflect pathological changes appearing systemically is spleen. Acting not only as blood storage but as active organ the spleen play an important role in innate immunity which can be stimulated by alimentary treatment of immune active food hydrocolloids. Two oat beta-glucan purified preparations with high (2,179,700 g/mol) and low (69,700 g/mol) molecular weight were prepared and their anti- oxidant, free radical scavenging activity, the ability to alleviate inflammatory conditions and protective properties against severe oxidant induced lipid peroxidation were evaluated. This study was performed on rats, divided into 3 groups: fed control diet and diet supplemented with small molecular mass and large molecular mass oat beta-glucans. Within groups animals were divided into controls and individuals with experimentally induced intestinal inflammation. Low molecular weight beta-glucan diet supplementation effectively decreased oxidative stress parameters in the control groups. The supplementation with high molecular weight beta-glucan in animals with inflammation decreases lipid superoxides, 7-ketocholesterol concentration and GSSG activity in rat spleens. In conclusion, beta-glucan possesses antioxidant properties as manifested by a reduction in superoxide dismutase and reductase activity. This study also demonstrated that diet supplementation with beta- glucan improves stress oxidative parameters in the spleen. It is especially important in the case of rats with induced gut inflammation. The encouraging results obtained from our experiment enables the use of this food hydrocolloid to form food formulation with protecting health properties. © 2015 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. 1. Introduction Inflammatory bowel diseases (IBD) constitute a wide range of chronic, enfeebling diseases of the gastrointestinal tract with Crohn's disease (CD) and ulcerative colitis (UC) being the two major phenotypes (Baumgart & Sandborn, 2012). Both these units possess a complex multifactorial pathogenesis in which genetics and life- style play a pivotal role as environmental factors. Multi-organ changes, which may occur during the development of IBD indi- cate that the inflammation in the gut affects the health of the whole organism. Development of Crohn's disease is often associated with a dysfunction of the spleen (hyposplenism) (Puli, Presti, & Alpert, 2003) or hypersplenism which occurs as a consequence of spleen's susceptibility to the development of many pathologies in the organism. Additionally intestinal obstruction is a common side effect of IBD (Katsanos et al., 2010) frequently associated with translocation of bacteria to various organs, including the spleen (S ¸ en * Corresponding author. Food Biotechnology Department, Institute of Chemistry and Food Technology, Faculty of Engineering and Economics, Wroclaw University of Economics, Komandorska 118/120, 53-345 Wroclaw, Poland. Tel.: þ48 713680249; fax: þ48 713680771. E-mail address: joanna.harasym@gmail.com (J. Harasym). Contents lists available at ScienceDirect Food Hydrocolloids journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/foodhyd http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.foodhyd.2015.05.025 0268-005X/© 2015 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. Food Hydrocolloids 51 (2015) 272e280