Separation, Characteristics, and Biological Activities of Phenolics in Areca Fruit

Fresh unripe areca fruit is the main ingredient of betel quid in Taiwan. The phenolics in whole fresh areca fruit involved condensed tannins (92 mg/g of dry wt), hydrolyzable tannins (69 mg/g of dry wt), non-tannin flavans (84 mg/g of dry wt) and simple phenolics (56 mg/g of dry wt). For liquid chromatography, Sephadex LH-20 gels were used to separate the condensed tannin and noncondensed tannin phenol fractions from the crude phenolic extract of areca fruit. The condensed tannin phenol fraction was rich in condensed tannins and simple phenolics. The noncondensed tannin phenol fraction contained abundant non-tannin flavans (catechin, epicatechin). The crude phenolic extract of areca fruit and its two separated fractions exhibited marked antioxidative activity and an antimutagenic effect on 2-amino-3-methylimidazo[4,5-f]quinoline toward Salmonella typhimurium TA98 and TA100, did not induce chromosomal aberration, and increased the frequency of sister chromatid exchange (SCE) in CHO-K1 cells.