“Essential Elements Profile in the Freshwater Snails Commonly Consumed by the Living Population of Manipur, a North Eastern State of India: An Insight to Use Snails as Nutraceutical Food”

Abstract

Snails, locally known as "Tharoi” are consumed as an authentic cuisine and form a major dietary component of the ethnic people of Manipur. To date, no study has been carried out on the essential elements content of the freshwater edible snails commonly consumed by the natives of Manipur. In this study, an analysis of essential major and trace elements was carried out in different meats of freshwater snails namely Filopaludina bengalensis., Cipangopaludina lecythis, Brotia costula and Paludomus pustulosa using sophisticated Inductively Coupled Plasma Optical Emission Spectroscopy (ICP-OES). The results of the study revealed that major elements namely Ca, K, P and Mg and trace elements such as Mn, Zn, Cr, Se and Cu were detected in varying concentrations in the meat tissues of freshwater snails. A high and notable concentration of P (137.68 ± 6.06 mg/100g) in Filopaludina bengalensis, K (324.01±10.94 mg/100g) in Paludomus pustulosa; Mg (477.42 ± 8.58 mg/100g) in Brotia costula (without spine) and Zn (19.78 ± 0.91 mg/100g) in Cipangopaludina lecythis (juvenile) were recorded in the present study. This study supports the health benefits of consuming freshwater snails by the natives of Manipur since they are found to be a good source of elements which play various physiological roles our body.