Synergistic, antagonistic and additive antioxidant effects in the binary mixtures

Food which is consumed by living organisms contains many antioxidants often with different antioxidant abilities. In the case of antioxidants mixture its potential is not always an additive value of antioxidant properties of their individual ingredients. Despite the extensive research there is still no knowledge about the reasons for observing the antioxidant antagonism and synergism in mixtures. The paper is a review which contains the literature information available about the antioxidant activity of binary mixtures. The manuscript presents different examples of natural mixtures with the literature proposed explanation of the observed antioxidant effects. It also describes different factors (i.e.: applied method, mechanisms of radical neutralization, composition of reacting mixture—chemical structures of antioxidants, concentration and molecular ratio, applied solvent, treatment of sample or reaction time) which have influence on the observed antioxidant effects. Additionally, the ways of expressing of the antioxidant effects are presented.