Fucoidans biological activities

Marine algae are potentially prolific sources of highly bioactive components that might represent useful leads in the development of new pharmaceutical agents and functional foods. This chapter discusses the current literature on biological activities of sulfated polysaccharides, fucoidans, from brown seaweeds. The profound functional properties of fucoidans could be employed in pharmaceutical, nutraceutical functional food, and cosmeceutical... 

TABLE 12.1 Biological activities of fucose-rich sulfated polysaccharides and fucoidan isolated from various brown seaweeds... 

Despite these biological activities, detailed study on the toxicology of brown algal fucoidan has been performed (Kim et al., 2010b). They have tested the toxicity of a 4-week oral trial of fucoidan extracted from the U. pinnatifida in Sprague-Dawley rats. 

In the field of pharmacology, the biologically active polysaccharides (PSs) that are derived from natural sources have attained a special place for the development of drug lead molecules. Marine macroalgae contain a significant amount of soluble PSs and have potential function as dietary fiber. Specially, brown marine algae are known to produce fimctional PSs such as alginates and fucoidans. Seaweed-derived PSs have been... 

M. S. Patankar, S. Oehninger, T. Barnett, R. L. Williams, G. F. Clark, A revised structure for fucoidan may explain some of its biological activities. J. Biol Chem. 1993 268, 21770-21776. 

Tissot, B. and Daniel, R. (2003) Biological properties of sulfated fucans the potent inhibiting activity of algal fucoidan against the human complement system. Glycobiology, 13, 29G-31G. 

Yang, C Chung, D Shin, IS Lee, HY Kim, JC Lee, YJ You, SG. Effects of molecular weight and hydrolysis conditions on anticancer activity of fucoidans from sporophyll of Undaria pinnatifida. International Journal of Biological Macromolecules, 2008, 43, 433-437. 

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