Facile purification of milligram to gram quantities of condensed tannins according to mean degree of polymerization and flavan-3-ol subunit composition

Unambiguous investigation of condensed tannin (CT) structure-activity relationships in biological systems requires well-characterized, high-purity CTs. Sephadex LH-20 and Toyopearl HW-50F resins were compared for separating CTs from acetone/water extracts and column fractions analyzed for flavan-3-ol subunits, mean degree of polymerization (mDP) and purity. Toyopearl HW-50F generated fractions with higher mDP values and better separation of procyanidins (PC) and prodelphinidins (PD) but required a pre-purification step, more time for large scale purifications and gave poorer recoveries. Therefore, two gradient elution schemes were developed for CT purification on Sephadex LH-20 providing 146 - 2000 mg/fraction. Fractions were analyzed by thiolysis and NMR spectroscopy. In general, PC/PD ratios decreased and mDP increased during elution. 1H NMR spectroscopy served as a rapid screening tool to qualitatively determine CT enrichment and carbohydrate impurities present, guiding fractionation towards re-purification or 1H-13C HSQC NMR spectroscopy and thiolysis. These protocols provide options for preparing highly pure CT samples

The effects of tannin-containing ground pine bark diet upon nutrient digestion, nitrogen balance, and mineral retention in meat goats

Background Pine bark is a rich source of phytochemical compounds including tannins, phenolic acids, anthocyanins, and fatty acids. These phytochemicals have potential to significantly impact on animal health and animal production. The goal of this work is to measure the effects of tannins in ground pine bark as a partial feed replacement on feed intake, dietary apparent digestibility, nitrogen balance, and mineral retention in meat goats. Results Eighteen Kiko cross goats (initial BW = 31.8 ± 1.49 kg) were randomly assigned to three treatment groups (n = 6). Dietary treatments were tested: control (0 % pine bark powder (PB) and 30 % wheat straw (WS)); 15 % PB and 15 % WS, and 30 % PB and 0 % WS. Although dry matter (DM) intake and digestibility were not affected (P > 0.10) by feeding PB, neutral detergent fiber (linear; P = 0.01), acid detergent fiber (linear; P = 0.001) and lignin digestibility (linear; P = 0.01) decreased, and crude protein (CP) digestibility tended to decrease (P = 0.09) as PB increased in the diet, apparent retention of Ca (P = 0.09), P (P = 0.03), Mg (P = 0.01), Mn (P = 0.01), Zn (P = 0.01) and Fe (P = 0.09) also increased linearly. Nitrogen intake and fecal N excretion were not affected (P > 0.05) by addition of PB in the diet, but N balance in the body was quadratically increased (P < 0.01) in the 15 % PB diet compared to other diets. This may be due to more rumen escape protein and less excreted N in the urine with the 15 % PB diet. The study showed that a moderate level of tannin-containing pine bark supplementation could improve gastrointestinal nitrogen balance with the aim of improving animal performance. Conclusion These results suggest that tannin-containing PB has negative impact on fiber, lignin, and protein digestibility, but positively impacted on N-balance

Correlation between lactosylation and denaturation of major whey proteins: an investigation by liquid chromatography-electrospray ionization mass spectrometry

The Maillard-reaction-induced lactosylation of the major whey proteins, alpha-lactalbumin (alpha-La) and beta-lactoglobulins (beta-Lg) A and B, occurring upon heating at 70, 80 and 90 degrees C for 1 to 5 h in the presence of lactose excess, was studied by HPLC coupled to electrospray ionization single and tandem mass spectrometry (HPLC-ESI-MS, MS/MS). The presence of significant amounts of mono and bi-lactosylated forms of the three proteins and their increase with heating temperature and time were assessed from MS data. Evidences for a concomitant, significant denaturation, involving partial tertiary structure unfolding, were also obtained in the case of beta-lactoglobulins. A subsequent ESI-MS and MS/MS investigation on the tryptic digests of heated protein solutions exhibiting high percentages of mono and bi-lactosylated forms provided information on lactosylation sites. In particular, the latter were identified both on tryptic and on aspecific peptides, whose unusual relevance (compared to similar studies) was found to be due mainly to heat-induced protein degradation, occurring before protein digestion with trypsin. Among lactosylation sites identified only on tryptic peptides, i.e., those reasonably related to intact protein lactosylation, two lysines residues were found for alpha-La, both located in accessible regions of its tertiary structure. In the case of beta-Lg, besides three sites common to variants A and B (leucine 1, lysines 70, and 75), lysine 69 was found to be lactosylated only in variant B. Its proximity to a critical region of beta-Lg tertiary structure suggests that the difference between the two variants could be ascribed to a different evolution of their conformation upon heating