Polysaccharides of higher fungi: Biological role, structure, and antioxidative activity

Abstract

Fungal polysaccharides attract a lot of attention due to their multiple challenging biological properties, such as: anti-tumor, anti-viral, anticomplementary, anticoagulant, hypolipidemic and immunomodulatory and immune-stimulatory activities, which all together make them suitable for application in many quite distinctive areas, such as food industry, biomedicine, cosmetology, agriculture, environmental protection and waste water management. This article presents results with respect to biological properties, structure and procedures related to the isolation and activation of polysaccharides of higher fungi. It is considered and presented along with a review of the critical antioxidative activity and possible influence of the structural composition of polysaccharide extracts (isolated from these higher fungi) upon their antioxidative properties.