Title : The role of catechins as natural iron chelator
Abstract:
Objective: iron overload in humans leads to liver injury, fibrosis, and eventually cirrhosis. Subsequently, an urgent need to develop a new safe, efficient and economic natural iron chelating agent was proposed during this work. The present work is a trial to investigate the relationship between iron pollution of drinking water and the levels of liver and spleen overloaded with iron in human body and albino rats and their treatment with natural iron chelating agent (catechin). Subjects and methods; types of drinking water samples collected from the different districts and 30 albino rats were subjected to analysis for iron biochemical and histopathology. The results from experimental work on rats showed the liver function tests and the levels of iron were highly significantly elevated in both treated liver and spleen groups in comparison to the control rat group which did not receive any treatment. On the other hand, the liver function tests and the iron level were highly significantly decreased in both liver and spleen of rats treated with iron-chelating agent which overloaded with iron when compared with iron-overload rat group only. Light microscopic examinations showed that sections from the liver and spleen for different groups revealed normal histopathological structure for control group and elevation of iron levels in both rat's liver and spleen overloaded with iron. Furthermore, iron concentration decreased in rats treated group with iron and natural chelating agent (catechin) when compared with iron overload rat group only.
Discussion: water samples analyzed for iron are found suitable for drinking except two samples show values of iron higher than the permissible limits of (WHO). Overall mean serum iron level in patients drinking groundwater is higher than in patients drinking surface water. The comparison between iron concentration in drinking water and blood samples shows positive relationship and this is confirmed experimentally where the iron overload caused the elevation of iron levels in both rat's liver and spleen.
Conclusion: catechin (aqueous green tea extract) leads to decrease of iron levels in liver and spleen of treated animals.
