The study, published in the Journal of Functional Foods, identified the novel compound, which is thought to be a product of the manufacturing process, in addition to 23 naturally derived phenolics belonging to lignan, coumarin, stilbene, and phenolic acid sub-classes in maple syrup.
“Our finding of a non-natural phenolic compound in maple syrup is interesting considering that such molecules may contribute significantly towards the reported biological activities of maple syrup,” said the researchers, led by Navindra Seeram, assistant professor in the Bioactive Botanical Research Laboratory, at the University of Rhode Island, USA.
“Given the worldwide popularity and consumption of this natural sweetener, chemical identification of maple syrup constituents is of great scientific interest,” they added.
Naturally healthy?
The authors explained that province of Quebec in Canada “leads the world’s production of maple syrup, a natural sweetener obtained by thermal evaporation of sap collected from maple (Acer) species.”
As a natural plant extract, maple syrup has been found to contain many beneficial compounds such as polyphenols, said the authors.
“Published studies have shown that maple syrup extracts have antioxidant, antimutagenic, and human cancer cell antiproliferative properties …To this end, our laboratory has embarked on a collaborative project to comprehensively identify the chemical constituents in maple syrup,” explained Seeram and his colleagues.
Study details
“As part of our laboratory’s detailed chemical investigation of Canadian maple syrup, a novel phenolic compound, 2,3,3-tri-(3-methoxy-4-hydroxyphenyl)-1-propanol, assigned the common name of quebecol, was obtained,” explained the researchers.
They said that quebecol was isolated as a pale off white amorphous powder, from a butanol extract of the maple syrup.
Upon further inspection, liquid chromatography mass spectral (LC-MS) analyses revealed that quebecol is not originally present in maple sap.
“This observation, as well as the lack of a feasible biosynthetic pathway to explain its origin, suggests that quebecol is formed during the processing and/or extraction of maple syrup,” said Seeram and his co-workers.
“Unfortunately, we did not obtain sufficient quantity of the pure isolated compound to conduct biological testing in the current study … Thus, further studies to evaluate the levels and presence of this compound in commercial maple products as well as other grades of maple syrup are warranted,” they added.
Source: Journal of Functional Foods
Published online ahead of print, doi: 10.1016/j.jff.2011.02.004
“Quebecol, a novel phenolic compound isolated from Canadian maple syrup”
Authors: L. Li, N.P. Seeram