Lipase and glycosidase activity assessment of select Aloe vera fractions for oral consumption

GALLEANO, M; MOSSE, JUANA I.; GARCÍA-TORNADU, ISABEL; HE, KAN

Boston

Simposio; Joslin International Symposium; 2019

Unbalanced diets are strongly associated with overweight and metabolic disruption development. Alternative strategies, e.g. food supplements able to inhibit pancreatic lipase (PL) and/or alpha-glucosidase (AG) could be beneficial for people at risk of metabolic syndrome. In folk medicine, the ingestion of Aloe vera whole leaf juice (including the latex) was used to relieve diabetic symptoms and lowering cholesterol. Commercial Aloe vera juice is purified of latex constituents (such as anthraquinones) via activated charcoal filtration, a process known as decolorization. Limited information is available regarding Aloe vera?s biological effects after decolorization.The aim of this study was to evaluate 20 different preparations of Aloe vera (whole leaf -WL- or inner leaf -InL-) after the decolorization process in terms of: a) chemical composition, b) in vitro inhibition of PL, and c) in vitro inhibition of AG. Several chemical differences were found among the InL and WL preparations, notably in minerals (16.8% InL to 19.3% WL), organic acids (38.1% InL to 52.6% DW) and major oligosaccharides (23.8% InL to 7.3% WL) content. InL was effective as in vitro PL inhibitors, showing an inhibitory rate up to 25%. Meanwhile only 1 type of WL extract showed inhibitory activity. The IC50?s of the active fractions was between 1.9-5.1 mg/ml. None of the samples produced a statistically significant inhibition of AG activity.This is the first report demonstrating that decolorized Aloe vera leaf preparations showing a strong inhibitory lipase activity. This activity could be related to the presence of a unique blend of polysaccharides.