Inhibition of vitamin C oxidation by DNA aptamers

RESEARCH REPORT

OpenAccess

ISSN: 2514-3247
Aptamers 
(2018), Vol 2, 28-35

Published online: 18 May 2018

Full Text Access

Alexander S Chiu1,*, Vinoth Sankarapani1, Rafal Drabek1, George W Jackson1, Robert H Batchelor1 and Yoon-Seong Kim2

1Base Pair Biotechnologies, 8619 Broadway St, Suite 100, Pearland, Texas, 77584, USA

2Nexmos Co Ltd, 2207 U-Tower, 767 Sinsu-Ro, Sooji-Gu, Yongin-Si, Gyeonggi-Do, South Korea

*Correspondence to: Alexander Chiu, Email: alex.chiu@basepairbio.com, Tel: +1 832 230 5518


RReceived: 16 February 2018 | Revised: 14 May 2018 | Accepted: 17 May 2018


© Copyright The Author(s). This is an open access article, published under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0). This license permits non-commercial use, distribution and reproduction of this article, provided the original work is appropriately acknowledged, with correct citation details.


ABSTRACT

Vitamin C (ascorbic acid) is not only commercially available as a nutritionally important dietary supplement, but is also used as a stabilizer in a wide range of other products, including beverages, cosmetics and therapeutics, because of its antioxidant properties. However, vitamin C itself undergoes oxidation upon storage, which decreases its efficacy as a stabilizer of other materials and also significantly reduces the shelf-life of products containing it as an active ingredient. Protecting such formulations and products against oxidation-induced degradation would thus be valuable. Here, we report the development of a new DNA aptamer that decreases the rate of oxidation of vitamin C in aqueous solution. We found that the presence of this aptamer reduced the rate of CuSO4-stimulated oxidation of vitamin C by more than 50% in aqueous solution. Furthermore, we also found that the aptamer increased the half-life of vitamin C by up to 1.7-fold in certain commercially available vitamin water formulations. This is the first description of aptamer-based stabilization of a commercially important substance and has significant implications for multiple industries.

KEYWORDS: SELEX, Vitamin C, Aptamer, Oxidation, Ascorbic acid, dehydroascorbic acid


 

Library Publishing Media is an Oxford (UK) based open-access publisher, established in 2005. All our electronic publications are freely available, without the need for subscription.

Our open-access, peer-reviewed journals include:


Privacy Policy | Disclaimer | Copyright

We use venue facilities provided by the University of Oxford Colleges and Departments for our events. However, we do not have any formal affiliation with the University or its colleges. Some of the images and models depicted on this website may be for demonstration purposes only.