Free radical scavenging effect of anthocyanins in red wines

Free radicals ale extremely harmful to living organisms in that, they attac k different constituents of the cell, leading to acceleration of the ageing process and sometimes even its destruction, or if the DNA is affected, irr eversible malfunctions. It is now widely recognised that the phenolic compo unds of wine have very high free radical scavenging potential. The aim of t his paper is to determine which of these phenolic compounds are responsible for the strong free radical scavenging potential of red wines. In order to do so, a red wine was fractionated into phenolic fractions. After extracti on and purification of these compounds from the wine, we have measured thei r free radical scavenging activities using an enzymatic method. The anthocy anic fraction showed a high free radical scavenging power in relation to th e other tannic fractions. In order to explain this phenomenon, some pure an thocyanins were studied and a relationship between their free radical scave nging activity and their molecular structure was suggested. (C) 1999 Publis hed by Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.