Anthocyanin Tissue Bioavailability in Animals: Possible Implications for Human Health. A Systematic Review

Anthocyanins (ACNs) are promising health-enhancing phenolic compounds. We focus on ACN animal tissue bioavailability to provide an evidentiary link between tissue ACNs and their associated health properties. We performed a systematic review of electronic libraries; 279 results were retrieved, and 13 publications met inclusion criteria. Extracted information included animal model employed, administration route, doses, analysis method, and ACN concentration values in tissues. Total ACN concentrations were detected in mice kidney (2.17 × 105 pmol/g), liver (1.73 × 105 pmol/g), heart (3.6 × 103 pmol/g), and lung (1.16 × 105 pmol/g); and in pig brain (6.08 × 103 pmol/g). ACNs showed a predominance of parent ACNs in long-term experiments versus an ACN metabolite predominance in short-term experiments. ACNs detected in animal tissues, such as cyanidin-3-glucoside, suggest it may have an important role in human health. This information could be useful to determine proper ACN-intake biomarkers in biological samples in futures studies. The AppleCOR Project (Subproject AGL2016-76943-C2-2-R and Suproject AGL2016-76943-C2-1-R) has been possible with the support of Ministerio de Economia , Indústria y Competitividad, the Agencia Estatal de Investigación (AEI) and the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF). B.A.S.-R. enjoys a 2017MFP-COFUND-30 predoctoral fellowship contract. This project has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation program under the Marie Skłodowska-Curie Grant Agreement No. 713679 and from the Universitat Rovira i Virgili (URV). Ú.C. has a Pla estratègic de recerca i innovació en salut (PERIS) postdoctoral grant (SLT002/16/00239; Catalunya, Spain) from Generalitat de Catalunya; NFOC-Salut group is a consolidated research group of Generalitat de Catalunya, Spain (2017 SGR 522).