Purification and Biochemical Characterization of Polyphenol Oxidase Extracted from Wheat Bran (Wan grano).

Currently, little is known about the characteristics of polyphenol oxidase from wheat bran, which is closely linked to the browning of wheat product. The wheat PPO was purified by ammonium sulfate precipitation, DEAE-Sepharose ion-exchange column, and Superdex G-75 chromatography column. Purified wheat PPO activity was 11.05-fold higher, its specific activity was 1365.12 U/mg, and its yield was 8.46%. SDS-PAGE showed that the molecular weight of wheat PPO was approximately 21 kDa. Its optimal pH and temperature were 6.5 and 35 °C for catechol as substrate, respectively. Twelve phenolic substrates from wheat and green tea were used for analyzing the substrate specificity. Wheat PPO showed the highest affinity to catechol due to its maximum Vmax (517.55 U·mL-1·min-1) and low Km (6.36 mM) values. Docking analysis revealed strong affinities between catechol, gallic acid, EGCG, and EC with binding energies of -5.28 kcal/mol, -4.65 kcal/mol, -4.21 kcal/mol, and -5.62 kcal/mol, respectively, for PPO. Sodium sulfite, ascorbic acid, and sodium bisulfite dramatically inhibited wheat PPO activity. Cu2+ and Ca2+ at 10 mM were considered potent activators and inhibitors for wheat PPO, respectively. This report provides a theoretical basis for controlling the enzymatic browning of wheat products fortified with green tea.

A critical review of Fuzhuan brick tea: processing, chemical constituents, health benefits and potential risk.

Fuzhuan brick tea (FBT) is a traditional popular beverage in the border regions of China. Nowadays, FBT has been attracted great attention due to its uniquely flavor and various health-promoting functions. An increasing number of efforts have been devoted to the studies on health benefits and chemistry of FBT over the last decades. However, FBT was still received much less attention than green tea, oolong tea and black tea. Therefore, it is necessary to review the current encouraging findings about processing, microorganisms, chemical constituents, health benefits and potential risk of FBT. The fungus fermentation is the key stage for processing of FBT, which is involved in a complex and unique microbial fermentation process. The fungal community in FBT is mainly dominated by "golden flower" fungi, which is identified as Aspergillus cristatus. A great diversity of novel compounds is formed and identified after a series of biochemical reactions during the fermentation process of FBT. FBT shows various biological activities, such as antioxidant, anti-inflammatory, anti-obesity, anti-bacterial, and anti-tumor activities. Furthermore, the potential risk of FBT was also discussed. It is expected that this review could be useful for stimulating further research of FBT.