*2.4. Antioxidant Capacity*

The antioxidant capacity of the extracts was determined using the DPPH• radical scavenging method with a BioTek Synergy HT spectrophotometric multidetection 96-well microplate reader [13]. The decrease in DPPH absorbance was measured at 515 nm. The antioxidant capacity was expressed as the inhibition percentage (IP) of DPPH radicals and was calculated using the following equation:

$$\text{°@ }\text{Irhibition} = \text{((A}\_0-\text{A}\_e)/\text{A}\_0) \times 100\tag{1}$$

where A0 is the absorbance of the blank and Ae is the absorbance at 30 min. A standard curve of Trolox (12.5–350 μM; R<sup>2</sup> = 0.9982) was used to determine the radical-scavenging activity, and the results are expressed as micromoles of Trolox equivalent per mL of extract. Three analyses were evaluated for each sample.
