The tangerine, a citrus to fight against infectious diseases

The tangerine, a citrus to fight against infectious diseases https://i2.wp.com/www.eresviral.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/La-mandarina-un-cítrico-para-batallar-contra-enfermedades-infecciosas.jpg?fit=212%2C146&ssl=1

The tangerine, a citrus to fight against infectious diseases







Constanza Luciardi, a fellow at the National Council for Scientific and Technical Research (CONICET) (Argentina), is one of the authors of a paper that demonstrates that essential oils and terpenes housed in the peel of the red tangerine, known scientifically as citrus reticulata , work as strategies to combat the aggressiveness of pathogenic bacteria in the body and weaken their resistance to antibiotics.



In this way, the inclusion of such beneficial derivatives in products of the pharmaceutical or food industry - in certain doses - could favor human health in their mourning against certain resistant infectious diseases. Some of them, produced by food (gastroenteritis, diarrhea or colic), or to control skin infections such as pyoderma, among others.



"The search starts from knowing the virtues of various regional natural products, beyond the nutritional ones," reveals Dr. Elena Cartagena, a researcher at the Institute of Pharmaceutical and Food Biotechnology (INBIOFAL, CONICET-UNT), who co-directed the research , together with Dr. Mario Arena.



"In this opportunity we work with different essential oils that are constituted by complex mixtures of volatile substances; mainly terpenes, produced by the metabolism of the vegetable, concentrating on the husks of these citrus fruits, "describes Cartagena. And he adds: "Among some of its multiple functions, antifungal, antiviral and antibacterial activity in high concentrations and free-living bacteria stand out."



The advance highlights a particularity that had not been explored: the ability of volatile oils and mandarin terpenes to attenuate microbial virulence, through the interruption of a bacterial communication mechanism or Quorum sensing (QS).







Okitsu mandarin (Photo: UNL)



In other words: they act by counteracting the mechanisms of resistance and bacterial pathogenicity, making them more sensitive to the action of chemical agents and the active defenses of the host. This is what the researcher expresses, as she details in detail the results already published in international journals such as LWT-Lebensmittel-Wissenschaft & Technologie.



These "antipathogenic", emphasizes Luciardi, have to combat the QS that controls the production of specific enzymes-one of them is the elastase, which degrades the structural components of the elastic tissues, facilitating the spread of the infection-, the toxic pigments, mobility and bacterial displacement (swarming) and, among the main aggressive factors, the Biofilm.



The latter is constituted by a set of bacteria that operate in coordination and a matrix of polysaccharides, which they themselves produce and which protects them from physical, chemical and biological stress, as well as the host's defenses, conferring, approximately, a resistance to antibiotics a thousand times greater than that of free-living bacteria. All these factors are responsible for the chronicity of infectious processes and intrahospital infections difficult to eradicate.



Without specifying costs, Luciardi clarifies that the concentrations that must be applied to confer the antipathogenic properties described are in the order of 10-100 micrograms / mL. That is, greater than those used by the pharmaceutical and food industries to flavor and aromatize their products with tangerine oils.



"This development has two enormous advantages. On the one hand, because it legitimizes the traditional or ethnomedical use of essential oils used since ancient times and, on the other hand, due to the importance that local agribusiness charges for generating added value through the use of husks that are often marginalized ", believes Luciardi.



"It is valuable and rewarding to be able to offer unconventional alternatives that may favor improving treatments against human diseases," says Cartagena, while stressing that in order to obtain these results they had to go through a long process that included chemical studies carried out in the University of Valencia, by Arena in collaboration with Dr. Amparo Blázquez, as well as biological ones.



Also, pharmacological studies for the development of a phytoproduct, or a nutraceutical, are in an advanced stage of research.



Finally, it should be noted that the World Health Organization (WHO) warned about the consequences of the proliferation of bacteria resistant to multiple antibiotics and the pathologies that trigger, both socioeconomic level and health security. He attributes the problem, above all, to two factors: the abuse and misuse of antibiotics, as well as the spread of residues of these medicines at an environmental level.



Given this perspective, national progress would represent a natural and effective alternative to help fight infectious diseases with ecological conscience. (Source: CONICET / DICYT)

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