1. Encapsulation of anthocyanin molecules within a ferritin nanocage increases their stability and cell uptake efficiency.
- Author
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Zhang, Tuo, Lv, Chenyan, Chen, Lingli, Bai, Guangling, Zhao, Guanghua, and Xu, Chuanshan
- Subjects
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ENCAPSULATION (Catalysis) , *ANTHOCYANINS , *FERRITIN , *PLANT pigments , *FOOD chemistry , *THERMAL stability - Abstract
Anthocyanins are very spectacular plant pigments with many biological activities. However, because of their highly reactive nature, anthocyanins are unstable. We developed a novel strategy for improving the thermal stability and photostability of cyanidin-3-O-glucoside (C3G) molecules by encapsulating them within the inner cavity of apo recombinant soybean seed H-2 subunit ferritin (rH-2). C3G molecules were successfully encapsulated within protein cages with a C3G/protein ratio of 37.5 to 1. As expected, such encapsulation increased the thermal stability and photostability of C3G molecules by a factor of ~2. More importantly, Caco-2 cell monolayer absorption and adhesion analyses showed that C3G molecules encapsulated within apoferritin nanocages were more efficient in transport as compared to free C3G. These findings indicate that protein with a shell-like structure as a nanoplatform can play an important role in the field of nutrition. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]
- Published
- 2014
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