Natural Colors in Common Foods You Should Know

Natural colors in food are colored substances in fresh food ingredients that can be perceived by human vision. Natural colors can be divided into polyene colors, phenolic colors, pyrrole colors, quinone and ketone colors, etc. According to the type of chemical structure. These substances were previously extracted and used in the color-mixing process in food processing. However, research in recent years has proved that these colors gradually attracted attention due to their special chemical groups and thus have the effect of regulating physiological functions, which may have an important role in the prevention of chronic diseases.

β-carotene, which is abundant in foods such as carrots, sweet potatoes, pumpkins, and oranges, mainly has the function of improving the nutritional status of vitamin A in the body; subsequently, it can play the same role as vitamin A in improving immunity, treating night blindness, and preventing and treating ocular dryness. In addition, β-carotene is also an important fat-soluble antioxidant substance in the body, which can scavenge mono-linear oxygen, hydroxyl radicals, superoxide radicals, and peroxyl radicals, and improve the antioxidant capacity of the body.

In recent years, more research on phenolic colors has been done on anthocyanins, anthocyanidins, and so on. Anthocyanin is an important class of water-soluble plant colors, mostly combined with sugar in the form of glycosides (called anthocyanins). Flavonoids, usually referred to as flavonoids and their derivatives, are a class of water-soluble yellow substances widely distributed in the cells of flowers, fruits, stems, and leaves of plants, and have analogous chemical structures and physiological activities with the aforementioned phenolic compounds.

Curcumin, a polyphenolic phytochemical purified from turmeric, is widely used in Chinese and Indian herbalism to relieve discomfort. Historically, turmeric has been used to improve smooth muscle function and digestion. More recently, the cytoprotective and immunomodulatory properties of curcumin have also become an area of great interest to the scientific community.