Acetylcholinesterase inhibitory effect of capsicum oleoresins – An in vitro study

The present study aimed to evaluate the acetylcholine esterase inhibitory effect of capsicum oleoresin. Capsicum extract were examined for their AChE inhibitory activities at different concentrations (10, 20, 40, 60, 80, 100, 120 and 140µg/ml) spectrophotometrically. The extract was dissolved in a base-tris (0.05 M) buffer. In this method, 200µl of acetylthiocholine iodide (15mM), 1000µl of DTNB (3mM), and 200µl of test extract solution at the different concentrations were mixed and incubated for 15 min at 30ºC. Then, the mixture was monitored spectrophotometrically at 412 nm 10 times, each 13 s. After that, 200µl of AChE (0.3U/ml) solution were added to the initial mixture, to start the reaction and then the absorbance was determined. Minimum inhibition of 7.2 ±0.37% at 10µg/ml and maximum inhibition of 78.26 ±1.26% at 140µg/ml was exhibited. The IC₅₀ was found to be 68.28µg/ml. Capsicum oleoresin at different concentrations showed a dose-dependent decrease in AChE activity which was promising to suggest it as a candidate for the management of Alzheimer's after further validation as it can increase the availability of acetylcholine.