Comparison of total phenolic contents and antioxidant activities of propolis in different solvents

Abstract

This study aims to deter-mine which solvent is the best for the solubility of the propolis by using concentra-tions of total polyphenols and flavonoids, ferric reduc-ing antioxidant power (FRAP) assay, and total an-tioxidant status (TAS) in extracts of propolis from different provinces of Tü-rkiye prepared with water, ethanol, dimethyl sulfoxide (DMSO), glycerol and ace-tone. Propolis samples were lyophilized in the same sol-vents except for that glycer-ol and acetone. Total con-centrations of polyphenols and flavonoids, FRAP, and TAS of both normal and ly-ophilized extracts were found be consistent when compared with each other. After extraction of propolis and evaluation of the total polyphenol and flavonoid content and antioxidant ca-pacity, we concluded that it is mostly dissolved in DMSO, and after that in ethanol, acetone, glycerol respectively, and the least in water according to our ex-traction and analysis meth-ods.