Evaluation and Characterization of Antioxidant and Immunomodulatory Activities of Colombian Sugar Cane-derived Extracts

The increasing interest in polyphenolic compounds, due to their strong antioxidant activities, has gathered attention around natural extracts for the development of nutraceutical and therapeutic agents. Although sugar cane (SC) has long been known for its high polyphenol content, composition-wise variability in SC-derived products, as well as scattered research in different fields has limited the exploitation of their potential as nutraceuticals and therapeutics for numerous diseases. Here, we assess and characterize the antioxidant and immunomodulatory activities of SC-derived extracts, namely sugar cane juice (SCJ), syrup (SCS) and non-centrifugal sugar (NCS). The radical scavenging potential of all extracts was evaluated and compared with DPPH and ABTS assays, in which SCJ showed a reduced scavenging potential as a result of SC milling, but a prompt recovery was observed upon thermal processing. Moreover, the quantification of secreted cytokines by LPS- and S. aureus-stimulated macrophages in the presence of SC-derived extracts demonstrated that SC derivatives exhibit strong anti-inflammatory activity. These results highlight the enormous therapeutic potential of SC derivatives, which could be exploited for alleviating the effects of diseases associated with chronic inflammation pathologies, such as cancer, diabetes, or neurodegeneration.