Kinetic study on the tyrosinase and melanin formation inhibitory activities of carthamus yellow isolated from Carthamus tinctorius L.

Carthamus yellow (CY) is the major component of the yellow pigments of Carthamus tinctorius L. CY has been extensively used as a natural color additive for food and cosmetics. Here, our results demonstrate that carthamus yellow reduced the activity of mushroom tyrosinase in a dose-dependent manner with a half maximal inhibitory concentration (IC50) value of approximately 1.01 ± 0.03 mg/mL. A kinetic study of carthamus yellow on tyrosinase exhibited a mode of competitive inhibition with a Ki of 0.607 mg/mL. Moreover, cell viability analysis indicated that carthamus yellow used at concentrations of 1.0–4.0 mg/mL had no cytotoxicity in B16F10 melanoma cells. Melanin content analysis showed that melanin production in B16F10 melanoma cells treated with 4 mg/mL carthamus yellow can decrease to 82.3 ± 0.4% of the levels of melanin production of untreated cells. Thus, carthamus yellow has the potential to become a useful skin-whitening agent in the future.