New Insights of Natural Compounds in Antioxidant and Anti-Inflammatory Properties

Dear Colleagues,

Recent research trends suggest that bioactive compounds from various natural sources will be among the most important ingredients in future new medicines, nutraceuticals, cosmetics, and dietary supplements. Discovering novel biologically active natural compounds is a major goal of the pharmaceutical world and many food companies, and further studies are being conducted in the medical community for their therapeutic effects in treating human diseases. Several studies have reported that bioactive molecules in natural compounds with antioxidant and anti-inflammatory properties help prevent various chronic diseases, such as metabolic syndrome and cardiovascular diseases. Current advances in natural source isolation and extraction technologies have made it easier to create optimized bioactive molecules with the potential to treat diseases. Over the past decades, various natural products which are rich sources of bioactive molecules have been studied for their use in the treatment of many human diseases; however, the mechanisms of their antioxidant and anti-inflammatory properties require much more study.

Oxidative stress and inflammation are known to play critical roles in aging and the development of chronic diseases, making them important targets for developing therapeutic strategies for disease control. Indeed, oxidative stress and inflammation are two pathophysiological processes that are closely related to and dependent on each other. Thus, approaches to reduce oxidative stress and inflammatory responses are considered increasingly important for chronic disease risk prevention and anti-aging.

In this Topic, we encourage the submission of research articles and timely reviews dealing with novel natural compounds with excellent antioxidant and anti-inflammatory properties. Research on the bioactive properties of natural substances extracted from plants and animals, as well as microorganisms and marine organisms and their synthetic derivatives, is also welcome. This topic also includes investigations on the health-promoting effects of natural products on chronic diseases, including inflammatory diseases, cancer, and aging. We hope that this Special Topic will provide readers with an update on the antioxidant and anti-inflammatory properties of new natural compounds and their therapeutic and preventive potential in treating various human diseases. We ask you to submit your latest research findings or review papers.

Dr. Jung Eun Kim
Prof. Dr. Bo Young Chung
Topic Editors