earticle

영어

Carotenoids being most important pigments among those occurring in nature, have received increased interestowing to their beneficial effects on human health. An effort is made to review marine carotenoids as important bioactivecompounds with reference to their presence, chemical, and biofunctional benefits they afford. The potential beneficial effectsof marine carotenoids were particularly focused on astaxanthin and fucoxanthin, major marine carotenoids found in marineanimals and aquatic plants, respectively. Both carotenoids show strong antioxidant activity which is attributed to quenchingsinglet oxygen and scavenging free radicals. The potential role of the carotenoids as dietary antioxidants has been suggested asbeing one of the main mechanism by which they afford their beneficial health effects such as anticancer activity and anti-inflammatory effect. Only recently, antiobesity effect and antidiabetic effect have been noted as specific and novel bio-functions of fucoxanthin. Nutrigenomic study reveals that fucoxanthin induces uncoupling protein 1 (UCP1) expression inwhite adipose tissue (WAT) mitochondria to lead to oxidation of fatty acids and heat production in WAT. Fucoxanthinimproves insulin resistance and decreases blood glucose level, at least in part, through the down-regulation of tumor necrosisfactor α (TNFα) in WAT of animals.