Abstract: The technology of extracting polysaccharide from garlic with cellulase was studied. The optimum extracting conditions were evaluated at 5% cellulase addition and 1.5 h extraction time with temperature at 50 ℃and pH 5.0. On these bases, the antioxidant activity of garlic polysaccharide as well as garlicin was also assayed. The results showed that the garlic polysaccharide has certain antioxidant activity, which increases with the increase of polysaccharide concentration. Moreover, it was also shown that garlic polysaccharide has higher scavenging effects on hydroxyl radical and superoxide radical than those of garlicin at relatively high concentration. Therefore the reductive capability of garlicin is stronger than garlic polysaccharide.

Key words: garlic polysaccharide, cellulase, antioxidant ability, extraction, garlicin