The human body on exposure to high-altitude, undergoes many physiological challenges. The cardiopulmonary reserves are favoured against the digestive system. Hence, the efficiency of digestion is compromised to a great extent, which leads to anorexia, hypophagia, epigastralgia, dyspepsia, nausea, and peptic ulcers. The present study was focused on in vitro digestive influence of selected food ingredients viz. cardamom, carom, cumin, coriander, fennel, fenugreek, ginger, pepper, star anise, turmeric, papaya, orange, pineapple, liquorice, valerian, and tarragon on the activities of digestive enzymes of rat pancreas, duodenum, and small intestine. In-vitro antioxidant activities of the above food ingredients were also carried out with respect to their radical scavenging activity against DPPH·, NO·, and ferrous reducing antioxidant power. All the studied food ingredients showed a comparative range of free radical scavenging activity. Further, pineapple has shown enhanced enzymatic activity of pancreatic amylase, trypsin and chymotrypsin among the tested samples with 432, 252, and 86%, respectively. However, all food ingredients showed inhibitory effect towards maltase activity, while the sucrose activity was enhanced in tarragon compared to control. Almost all the selected food ingredients have been observed to have low glycemic index and low protein efficiency ratio except pineapple. The results suggested that ample merit in the use of pineapple extract can be carried forward for the formulation of highly digestible foods for extreme environmental conditions.
Keywords: Antioxidant activity; Digestive enzymes; Glycemic index; Herbs; Protein efficiency ratio; Spices.