Nutraceutical, Anti-Inflammatory, and Immune Modulatory Effects of β-Glucan Isolated from Yeast

beta-Glucan is a dietary fibre, found in many natural sources, and controls chronic metabolic diseases effectively. However, beta-glucan from the yeast has rarely been investigated. Objectively, conditions were optimized to isolate beta-glucan from the yeast (max. 66% yield); those optimized conditions included 1.0 M NaOH, pH 7.0, and 90 degrees C. The purity and identity of the isolated beta-glucan were characterized through FT-IR, SEM, DSC, and physicofunctional properties. The obtained results from DSC revealed highly stable beta-glucan (m.p., 125 degrees C) with antioxidant activity (TAC value 0.240 +/- 0.0021 mu g/mg, H2O2 scavenging 38%), which has promising bile acid binding 40.463% and glucose control (in vitro). In line with these results, we evaluated the in vivo anti-inflammatory potential, that is, myeloperoxidase activity and reduction in MDA and NO; protective effect on proteins and keeping viscosity within normal range exhibited improvement. Also, the in vivo cholesterol binding and reduction in the skin thickness by beta-glucan were highly encouraging. Finally, our results confirmed that yeast beta-glucan is effective against some of the inflammatory and oxidative stress markers studied in this investigation. In general, the effect of 4% beta-glucan was more noticeable versus 2% beta-glucan. Therefore, our results support the utilization of beta-glucan as a novel, economically cheap, and functional food ingredient.