Medicinal and edible lignicolous fungi as natural sources of antioxidative and antibacterial agents

The antioxidant activity of organic extracts of eight fungal species, Ganoderma lucidum, Ganoderma applanatum, Meripilus giganteus, Laetiporus sulphureus, Flammulina velutipes, Coriolus versicolor, Pleurotus ostreatus and Panus tigrinus, was evaluated for free radical (DPPH^· and OH^·) scavenging capacity and an effect on lipid peroxidation, and the antibacterial activity was tested by the agar well diffusion method. The highest DPPH^· scavenging activity was found in the methanol extract of G. applanatum (12.5 μg/mL, 82.80%) and the chloroform extract of G. lucidum (510.2 μg/mL, 69.12%). The same extracts also showed the highest LP inhibition (91.83%, 85.09%) at 500 μg/mL, while the methanol extracts of G. applanatum and L. sulphureus showed the highest scavenging effect on OH^· radicals (68.47%, 57.06%, respectively) at 400 μg/mL. A strong antibacterial activity against Gram‐positive bacteria was also manifested. The antioxidative potencies correlated generally with the total phenol content (0.19–9.98 mg/g). The HPLC determination showed that the majority of analysed species contained gallic and protocatechic acids. Consequently, these fungi are shown to be potential sources of antioxidative and antibacterial agents. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.