Dados do Trabalho

Título

PRESSURIZED LIQUID EXTRACTION OF PHENOLIC COMPOUNDS FROM BABASSU MESOCARP: A COMPARISON WITH CONVENTIONAL EXTRACTION METHOD

Introdução

Babassu mesocarp is a starchy coproduct obtained during the processing of babassu fruit. However, the starch isolation procedure generates a large amount of extracts, which are little explored. Therefore, it is hypothesized that the extracts are a promising source of bioactive compounds. Based on this context, this work aimed to recover the phenolic compounds from babassu mesocarp by comparing the pressurized liquid extraction (PLE) with conventional maceration.

Material e Métodos

The PLE was performed in three batches with a static period of 5 min each. The temperatures of 55, 75 and 95 °C were tested, using ethanol-water mixture (75%, v/v) as solvent. Pressure and volumetric flow rate were kept constant at 10.0 ± 0.5 MPa and 5.0 mL/min, respectively. For the maceration, the sample was immersed in 30 mL of ethanol-water mixture (75%, v/v) and kept at room temperature during 24 h. After that, the solution was centrifuged for 15 min at 3200 rpm and the extract was collected. All extracts were analyzed for their total phenolic content (TPC) (expressed as mg of gallic acid equivalent per g sample - mg GAE/g) and antioxidant capacity by DPPH and ABTS methods (expressed as µmol of Trolox equivalents per g sample - µmol TE/g).

Resultados e Discussão

The content of TPC ranged from 12.45 to 19.79 mg GAE/g. In general, TPC did not present a significant difference (p>0.05) between the treatments. For the DPPH method, the extract obtained at 95 ºC and by maceration presented the highest (130.54 µmol TE/g) and lowest (54.5 µmol TE/g) values, respectively. For the ABTS method, the values ranged from 158.09 and 305.84 µmol TE/g, but there was no statistical difference (p>0.05) in the maceration method with PLE at 75 ºC and 95 ºC. Thus, the results showed that PLE is an attractive technique to recover bioactive compounds from babassu mesocarp, since it allows faster extraction time in comparison to maceration. Moreover, PLE at 95 ºC might increase the antioxidant activity of the extract. However, the identification and quantification of individual compounds need to be investigated.

Conclusão

Thus, the results showed that PLE is an attractive technique to recover bioactive compounds from babassu mesocarp, since it allows faster extraction time in comparison to maceration. However, the identification and quantification of individual compounds need to be investigated.