77 Antioxidant Activity and Quantitative Composition of Extracts of Piper Species from Guatemala with Potential Use in Natural Product Industry A. Cáceres, S.M. Cruz, I. Gaitán, K. Guerrero, L.E. Álvarez and M.N. Marroquín Facultad de CCQQ y Farmacia Universidad de San Carlos (USAC) Guatemala Keywords: Piper variabile, Piper psilorhachis, Piper retalhuleuense, Piper jacquemontianum, Piper oradendron, Piper schippianum Abstract There is growing evidence that many diseases are caused by oxidative processes, contributing to the etiology of chronic and degenerative diseases. Antioxidant activity is also interesting in industry for food conservation and cosmetics. Piper is an important tropical genus with high chemical and biological diversity; one of the important molecules is piperine, isolated from P. nigrum. Leaves and roots of 11 native species (P. amalago, P. hispidum, P. jacquemontianum, P. oradendron, P. patulum, P. psilorhachis, P. retalhuleuense, P. schippianum, P. sempervirens, P. umbellatum and P. variabile) were collected. Dry extracts with dichloromethane and methanol were prepared by percolation. Antioxidant activity was evaluated by total phenolics, DPPH, and ABTS. Phytochemical screening was performed, and by spectrophotometry UV/Vis, piperine, and flavonoids were quantified. Important antioxidant activity was found in the methanol extract of leaves of P. psilorhachis, P. schippianum and P. variabile, which were positive by the three methods. The methanol extracts of P. oradendron showed activity only by ABTS, but both leaves and roots. TLC and UV/Vis procedures were established to assess the presence and amount of piperine. The 17 extracts showing similar bands to P. nigrum by TLC were analyzed. The highest concentrations were in P. jacquemontianum, P. retalhuleuense and P. amalago, with contents higher than P. nigrum standard. By TLC all extracts contained flavonoids, the methanol extract of P. variabile had the highest number of bands, but quantification gave only 0.38%; the greatest amount was demonstrated in the leaves of P. oradendron (1.57%) and P. hispidum (0.87%). It is concluded that at least three of the extract have an important antioxidant activity that could be applied by the natural product industry. INTRODUCTION Piper is an important pantropical genus with high potential as aroma, color, food and medicine. The lead specie is P. nigrum for its fruits as a spice with commercial importance since ancient times and multiple biological activities (Ahmad et al., 2012), including antioxidant activity demonstrated by several methods (Gülçin, 2005). The genus includes more than 1,000 species, about 300 from the Americas, some have ample ethnobotanical use, presenting high complexity from the botanical, biological and chemical point of view. Biogeography of the genus indicates high diversity, but in the continent three provinces are recognized: Central America, Mexico and Colombian northwest, the Amazonian basin, and the Atlantic forest from Brazil (Marquis, 2004). The rich biodiversity of Guatemala is threatened for lack of conscience from the population, but mainly due to the ignorance of the properties and virtues of this biological heritage. Most of the species from Piper described in Guatemala has some popular use. At least 88 species have been described from Guatemala, several native and even endemic of this biogeographic region (Standley and Steyermark, 1952); some of them have a specific popular name, but several of the useful species are indistinguishably named “cordoncillo” with little ethopharmacological information. General phytochemical investigations demonstrated the presence of essential oils Proc. IS on Medicinal and Aromatic Plants – IMAPS 2010 and “History of Mayan Ethnopharmacology” – IMAPS 2011 Eds.: J. Ghaemghami et al. Acta Hort. 964, ISHS 2012