Structural, rheological, antioxidant, and functional properties of β–glucan extracted from edible mushrooms Agaricus bisporus, Pleurotus ostreatus and Coprinus attrimentarius

β-glucan was extracted from three edible mushroom varieties namely Agaricus bisporus, Pleurotus ostreatus and Coprinus attrimentarius using hot water extraction method. The extracted β-glucan was studied to investigate its structural, rheological, antioxidant and functional properties. The ATR-FTIR was used to elicit the structural conformations of the three β-glucan and SEM was used to study the surface topography. The rheological properties showed that with the increase in the concentration of β-glucan, the elastic behavior increased. The antioxidant activities were determined using different assays like DPPH (2, 2-diphenyl-1-picryl-hydrazyl), reducing power, metal chelating ability and ABTS (2,2-Azino-bis, 3-ethylbenzothiazoline-6- sulfonic acid) and all these activities varied significantly (p≤0.05) among all the β-glucan, however the β-glucan from Coprinus attrimentarius showed the highest values for all antioxidant activities. As far as the functional properties were concerned, Coprinus β-glucan also showed the highest swelling power, fat binding, emulsifying properties, bile acid binding capacity and viscosity, however foaming properties were the highest in Pleurotus β-glucan.