A review of in vitro antioxidant and antidiabetic polysaccharides: Extraction methods, physicochemical and structure-activity relationships

Nowadays, various plant polysaccharides have been successfully extracted which exhibited strong biological activities and might be useful for diabetes management. However, the effect of extraction methods, physicochemical and the structural-activity relationships of polysaccharides to exhibit antioxidants and antidiabetics were inadequate to explain their mechanism in action. The uses of advance extraction methods might be preferred to obtain higher antioxidants and antidiabetic activities of polysaccharides compared to conventional methods, but the determination of optimal extraction conditions might be crucial to preserve their structure and biological functions. Other than that, the physicochemical and structural properties of polysaccharides were closely related to their biological activities such as antioxidant and antidiabetic activities. Therefore, this review addressed the research gap of the influence of extraction methods, physicochemical and structural relationships of polysaccharides to biological activities, pointing out the challenges and limitations as well as future prospects to the current findings.