Antioxidant Activity of Vegetables and Their Blends in Iron -Catalyzed Model Systems

Vegetables are known to contain high amounts of natural antioxidants such as ascorbate, $\alpha$-tocopherol, $\beta$-carotene, and flavinoids. The antioxidant activities of several vegetables including broccoli, carrot , green pepper, spinach and tomato, and their blends were investigated using various iron-catalyzed lipid peroxidation systems. In linoleic acid micelles, carrot and spinach significantly inhibited lipid peroxidation by 29.0% and 35.8% , respectively (p<0.05).Blends of two, three , or four vegetables indluding spinach increased the inhibitory effect on lipid peroxidation, mainly due to high level of antioxidants in spinach. In beef homogenates, tomato significantly inhibited lipid peroxidation by 19.9%(p<0.05), whereas spinach and broccoli significantly stimulated lipid peroxidation by 67.3% and 11.5%, respectively (p<0.05). In the presence of 100$\mu$M ferrous ions, all vegetables inhibited degradation of deoxy-ribose by 43.6~77.6%(p<0.05). In the presence of 100$\mu$M ferric ions , broccoli and spinach stimulated deoxyribose degradation by 39.8% and 55.8%, respectively. These results indicate that the antioxidant activity of vegetables varied with the different model systems and depended on the provided environment such as iron content and substrates. The activity of the various combinations (blends) of vegetables was strongly related to that of the individual vegetable.