Measuring Antioxidant Activity
Wild Blueberries emerged as the leader in total antioxidant capacity (TAC) per serving using a laboratory research procedure called Oxygen Radical Absorbance Capacity or ORAC. The ORAC procedure was developed by Dr. Guihua Cao, a physician and chemist at the USDA Jean Mayer Human Nutrition Research Center on Aging in Boston. In 2010, USDA ORAC studies showed that a serving of Wild Blueberries provides twice the antioxidant capacity of larger, cultivated blueberries.
A recent advancement in the measurement of antioxidant activity in foods is the cellular antioxidant activity (CAA) assay, developed by the Cornell University Department of Food Science. The CAA assay provides information on the uptake, metabolism, distribution and activity of antioxidant compounds in cells. Lead researcher Rui Hai Liu, Ph.D., used the CAA assay to determine that Wild Blueberries performed better in cells than cranberries, apples and both red and green grapes.
