A comparative study of the phenolic compounds and the in vitro antioxidant activity of different Brazilian teas using multivariate statistical techniques

AbstractA total of 51 Brazilian teas from the species Camellia sinensis, Peumus boldus, Matricaria recutita, Baccharis trimera, Cymbopogon citratus, Pimpinella anisum, Mentha piperita, and Ilex paraguariensis were analyzed in terms of phenolic compounds, color and in vitro antioxidant capacity using ferric reducing antioxidant power (FRAP) and 1,1-diphenyl-2-picrylhydrazyl (DPPH) assays. Data were processed using principal component analysis (PCA), hierarchical cluster analysis (HCA) and linear discriminant analysis (LDA). Significant (P<0.01) correlations between antioxidant activity measured by DPPH and FRAP assays with the total phenolic compounds (r=0.87; r=0.90, respectively) and flavonoids (r=0.79; r=0.77, respectively) were attained. The compounds that displayed significant (P