Comparative study on antioxidant activity of different varieties of commonly consumed legumes in India

Legumes are rich source of proteins, dietary fiber, micronutrients and bioactive phytochemicals. Thirty different varieties of commonly consumed legumes in India, were screened for phenolic content and antioxidant activity using, radical scavenging (1,1-diphenyl-2-picryl-hydrazyl (DPPH) and 2,2′-azino-bis (3-ethylbenz-thiazoline-6-sulfonic acid, (ABTS⁺)], Ferric Reducing Antioxidant Power (FRAP) and metal ion (Fe²⁺) chelation assays. Legumes varied largely in their antioxidant activity. Horse gram, common beans, cowpea (brown and red) and fenugreek showed high DPPH radical scavenging activity (>400 units/g), while lablab bean (cream and white), chickpea (cream and green), butter bean and pea (white and green) showed low antioxidant activity (<125 units/g). Green gram, black gram, pigeon pea, lentils, cowpea (white) and common bean (maroon) showed intermediate activity. Similar trend was observed when the activity was assessed with ABTS⁺ and FRAP assays. Thus most of the varieties having light color seed coat, except soybean exhibited low antioxidant activity. While legumes having dark color seed coat did not always possessed high antioxidant activity (e.g. moth bean, black pea, black gram, lentils). Antioxidant activity showed positive correlation (r² > 0.95) with phenolic contents, in DPPH, ABTS⁺ and FRAP assays, whereas poor correlation (r² = 0.297) was observed between Fe²⁺ chelating activity of the legumes and phenolic contents.