Shiny E.C. Kachhap
Ranchi University, India
Title: Effect of dietary chitosan extracted from carapace of freshwater crab Sartoriana spinigera on body weight, liver weight and food intake of hyper-cholesterolemic albino rats
Biography
Biography: Shiny E.C. Kachhap
Abstract
Obesity may be defined as a condition where overaccumulation of fat occurs in adipocytes that might have a negative effect on one’s health. Excess body weight due to uncontrolled eating habits leads to increased risk of many diseases. Treatment of obesity is very costly, therefore, the present society demands for medicines of natural origin that can cure, rather prevent obesity from developing. Chitosan is one such natural zootherapeutic medicine that is found in the exoskeleton of arthropods, crustaceans. Chitosan, a cationic biopolymer has affinity towards anionic fatty acids and does not allow them to get deposited in the body tissues and organs. In this experiment, Chitosan was extracted from carapace of Sartoriana spinigera , a locally found freshwater crab of Jharkhand, India. The obtained chitosan was characterized by FTIR and degree of deacetylation was found to be 78.53 %.20 albino rats were divided into 4 groups: Group A(normal diet),group B(High fat diet),group C(high fat diet+5% chitosan),group D(high fat diet +5% synthetic hypolipidemic drug).Parameters of body weight,liver weight and food intake in all groups were measured after 30 days. Statistical analysis by Student’s t test revealed that group C fed with chitosan showed lower body weight gain than group B at 1% significance.Statistical analysis also showed that average food intake of group C was least amongst all groups and was significantly lower than that of group B at 0.1%.The final liver weight of rats was also found to be significantly lower in group C than group B at 0.1% level. Ultrastructural studies of hepatocytes of different groups also confirmed that chitosan fed rats showed curing of pathological deformities observed in HFD fed rats.The findings confirm that Chitosan causes satiety and decreases body weight gain and liver weight,thereby preventing obesity. Thus, Chitosan extracted from Sartoriana spinigera should be encouraged as medicines against obesity.