Nutritional constituent and health benefits of chickpea (Cicer arietinum L.): A review

Chemical composition of various parts of the Chickpea plant, biological activities and functional molecular mechanism associated with these constituents of Chickpea (Cicer arietinum L.). [Display omitted] •Chickpea contains various beneficial and abundant compounds.•The bioactivities have been observed in different parts of the chickpea plant.•The evidence is based on in vitro and in vivo studies of chickpea.•The synergistic and antagonistic effects between chickpea components are essential.•The functional form of the substances in humans should be given great attention. Chickpea (Cicer arietinum L.), an annual plant of the Fabaceae family, is mainly grown in temperate and semiarid regions. Its biological activity and beneficial contribution to human health have been scientifically confirmed as an essential source of nutritional components. The objective of this review was to summarize and update latest available scientific data and information, on bioactive components in chickpea, bio-activities, and molecular mechanisms, which has mainly focused on the detection of relevant biochemical indicators, the regulation of signaling pathways, essential genes and proteins. The studies have shown that chickpea have significant multifunctional activities, which are closely related to the functionally active small molecule peptides and phytochemicals of chickpea. Significantly, numerous studies have only addressed the functional activity and mechanisms of single active components of chickpea, however, overlooking the synergy and antagonism between chickpea components, changes of functional active components in different processing methods, as well as the active form of the substances after human digestion and metabolism. Additionally, due to limitations in research methods and techniques, the structure of most functional active substances have not been determined, which makes it difficult to conduct interaction mechanism studies. Consequently, the significant bio-activity of the functional components of chickpea, synergistic and antagonistic effects and activity differences between bioactive components should be further studied.