Cooked, milled purple-fleshed sweet potato (PFSP) accessions, PM09.812 and PM09.960, underwent
digestion in a dynamic human gastrointestinal (GI) model that simulates gut digestive conditions to
study the bioaccessibility and biotransformation of anthocyanins. Matrix-assisted laser desorption
ionization time-of-flight mass spectrometry showed accession-dependent variations in anthocyanin
release and degradation. After 24 h, more anthocyanin species were detected in the small intestinal vessel
relative to other vessels for accession PM09.960 whereas more species appeared in the ascending colonic
vessel for accession PM09.812. The ferric reducing antioxidant power was increased in the small
intestinal vessel for PM09.960 and in the ascending colonic vessel for accession PM09.812, corresponding
to the appearance of a majority of anthocyanins for each accession. These results show that intestinal
and colonic microbial digestion of PFSP leads to an accession-dependent pattern for anthocyanin
bioaccessibility and degradation.