Aqueous Soybean Extract Reduces the Blood Lymphocyte Fraction in Immunized Mice, Independently of Its Stigmasterol Content
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.35898/ghmj-931352Keywords:
Glycine max, Stigmasterol, Lymphocyte, Sheep red blood cells, ImmunomodulationAbstract
Background: Immunosuppressant therapy remains central to the management of autoimmune disease, motivating the search for accessible plant-derived immunomodulators; soybean (Glycine max) is rich in phytosterols, and stigmasterol has been proposed as a lymphocyte-suppressing constituent.
Aims: To test whether the activity of a whole aqueous soybean extract on the circulating lymphocyte fraction is attributable to its stigmasterol content, by comparing the extract directly with purified stigmasterol.
Methods: Aqueous maceration yielded 450 g of extract from 2.5 kg of soybean, and stigmasterol was estimated by HPLC. Male BALB/c mice (n = 3 per group) were immunized with 1% sheep red blood cells (SRBC) on days 0 and 10 and treated orally from day 10 to 24 with extract (EK) or purified stigmasterol (STG) at 10, 50, or 100 mg per animal per day; lymphocyte counts were made from blood smears on days 9, 18, and 24.
Results: HPLC placed extract stigmasterol at or below the limit of quantification, indicating that matched nominal doses of extract and purified compound delivered very different amounts of stigmasterol. At day 24, all six treated groups showed a lower lymphocyte fraction than the immunized untreated control (K+, 43.0 ± 1.7; one-way ANOVA F(7,16) = 83.8, p < 0.0001, ω² = 0.96), and a split-plot analysis gave a significant group × time interaction (F(14,32) = 25.1, p < 0.0001). The non-immunized control did not differ from K+. The extract produced a dose-dependent reduction (EK100, 22.1 ± 3.1); stigmasterol also lowered lymphocytes but, being solubility-limited and of unverified delivered dose, could not be read as a dose–response.
Conclusion: Because the activity was recovered by aqueous extraction whereas stigmasterol is practically water-insoluble, stigmasterol is unlikely to be the constituent responsible; other water-soluble soy constituents are more probable mediators. A key limitation is that the delivered dose in the purified-stigmasterol arm could not be verified owing to its poor aqueous solubility. As the outcome was the circulating lymphocyte fraction rather than an SRBC-specific antibody titre, the findings do not by themselves establish suppression of the antigen-specific response.
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Copyright (c) 2026 Lawrence B.V. Djama, B.Sc., M.Sc., Dr.rer.nat. Kukuh Madyaningrana, S.Si., M.Biotech., drh. Vinsa C. Prakasita, M.Sc.
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