Formulation of microencapsulated rutin and evaluation of bioactivity and stability upon in vitro digestive and dialysis conditions

Rutin, a flavanol, has been demonstrating excellent antioxidant, anti-inflammatory, anti-diabetic, and anti-carcinogenic properties. However, bioavailability is low due to low stability, solubility, digestion, and absorption by the intestine. This study aims to encapsulate rutin with three types of carrier Materials using three different techniques and evaluate their antioxidant activity and bioactivity retention under in vitro gastrointestinal and dialysis conditions. Results showed that the rutin encapsulated lipid carrier has the highest radical inhibition activity for all the digestive phases, the highest singlet oxygen scavenging activity after the gastric phase and the highest anti-inflammatory activity for the dialyzable fraction. The rutin content of encapsulated lipid carriers for all the digestive phases was significantly higher (P≤0.05) comparatively. Fourier Transform Infrared spectroscopy, Particle size analysis, and Scanning Electron micrographs showed that rutin encapsulated lipid carrier was 1.7 μm with a polydispersity index of 0.909 indicating micro-encapsulation with heterogeneous dispersion.