LAUSR

Abstract The main aim of the current study was to include (+)catechin to form packing complexes with beta-cyclodextrin under three different complexation conditions. In particular, inclusion was by maceration without solvent, by involving hexane and supercritical carbon dioxide as complexation media, respectively. The examined responses were the spectral/thermal properties (determined by H NMR, XRD, FT-IR/ATR, FT-Raman, TGA and DSC), and the antioxidant activities (based on the DPPH assay) of the obtained inclusion compounds. The first set of responses supported qualitatively that inclusion compounds were formed under all the examined conditions of complexation, while the second group of results shown that the equilibrium antioxidant activity of the three different complexes were approximately four times higher than that of free chatechin. The effect of the method of inclusion on the antioxidant activity of the complexes at equilibrium was negligible ( p -value > 0.05).