Nutritional and Physicochemical Characteristics of the Antidementia Acetylcho-linesterase-Inhibiting Methanol Extracts from Umbilicaria esculenta

To develop new antidementia nutraceuticals, a potent acetylcholinesterase (AChE)-inhibiting extract was screened from various extracts of nutritional mushrooms and lichens nutritional and its physicochemical properties were investigated. Among the several extracts tested, methanol extracts of Umbilicaria esculenta fruiting body showed the highest AChE inhibitory activity of 22.4%. U. esculenta AChE inhibitor was maximally extracted when fruiting bodies were treated with 80% methanol at $40^{\circ}C$ for 18 h. The methanol extracts contained 18.9% crude lipid, 18.8% crude protein, and 11.6% total sugar. In addition, they contained 444 mg/g glutamic acid, 44 mg/g histidine, and 41 mg/g aspartic acid. The methanol extracts were soluble in a solution of methanol and 20% dimethylsulfoxide, insoluble in n-hexane, chloroform, and water, and were stable at $20{\sim}60^{\circ}C$ and pH $1.0{\sim}5.0$ for 1 h.