Resveratrol exerts several pharmacological activities, including anti-cancer, anti-inflammatory, cardioprotective, or antioxidant effects. However, due to its occurrence in plants more in glycosidic form as piceid, the bioavailability and bioactivity are limited. The enzymatic potential of probiotics for the transformation of piceid to resveratrol was elucidated. Cell extract from Bifidobacteria (B.) infantis, B. bifidum, Lactobacillus (L.) casei, L. plantarum, and L. acidophilus was evaluated for their effect in this bioconversion using high-performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) as analytical tool. Cell extract of B. infantis showed the highest effect on the deglycosylation of piceid to resveratrol, already after 30 min. Cell extracts of all other tested strains showed a significant biotransformation with no further metabolization of resveratrol. The conversion of piceid to resveratrol is of importance to increase bioavailability and bioactivity as shown for anti-inflammation in this study. Cell extracts from probiotics, especially from B. infantis, may be added to piceid containing products, for achieving higher biological effects caused by the bioactivity of resveratrol or by health promoting of the probiotics. These findings open a new perspective of novel combination of cell extracts from probiotics and piceid, in health-promoting pharmaceutical and food products.

Inulin has interesting physicochemical and functional properties, and therefore a wide range of applications in the food and medical industries. It has gained great traction due to its ability to form nanoparticles and its possible application as nanovehicle for drug delivery. In this work, we demonstrated that the enzymatically-synthesized high molecular weight (HMW) inulin forms stable spherical nanoparticles with an average diameter of 112 ± 5 nm. The self-assemblage of HMW inulin nanoparticles is carried out during enzymatic synthesis of the polymer, and become detectable after a certain critical aggregation concentration (CAC) is reached. Both, the CAC and nanoparticle size are influenced by the reaction temperature. These nanoparticles are not toxic for peripheral blood mononuclear cells, at concentrations below 200 μg/mL; no significant prebiotic potential was detected in cultures of 13 probiotic strains. This work contributes to a better understanding of the formation of HMW inulin nanoparticles and their biological properties.