Abstract
Fruit processing contributes significantly to the agricultural exportation of the Amazonian; however, it generates large amounts of solid waste, despite its high content of bioactive compounds and nutritional properties, and they are discarded in the environment. Therefore, in order to add economic value and potential reuse of agro-industrial by-products from cocoa, cupuassu, pracaxi, and tucumã, we investigated the chemical characteristics of the seed by-product resulting from the industrial extraction of these oils. The investigation of the nutritional and chemical composition of by-product was submitted to green extraction, besides other qualitative and quantitative techniques for the characterization of the main bioactive compounds. The extracts obtained from these by-products had a significant total polyphenol content and antioxidant activity. HPLC analysis identified and quantified some flavonoids present in these by-products (gallic, caffeic and protocatechuic acid, epigallocatechin-3-gallate, epicatechin, catechin, and quercetin). The oil from these species is widely used in the treatment of skin scarring and inflammation and is also used by the cosmetic industry. These results show that these by-products have a great potential for use, since they still have bioactive substances in their composition, which could alternatively be used in the pharmaceutical, cosmetic, or food industries.
Highlights
Brazil is currently one of the world’s three largest fruit producers, associated with China and India
Brazil makes up 45.9% of world production a year, 2014 accounted for approximately 830.4 million tons of fruit [1]; many of them come from the Amazon region, where there is a diversity in economic fruit species, with huge agroindustrial and nutritional potential in the development of new products [2]
Natsume et al [45] point out that it is possible to carry out the identification and quantification of those elements in plant extracts and their derivatives; the analysis applied may be: reverse-phase High-performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) (RP-LC) and reverse-phase HPLC-mass spectrometry (RP-LC/MS), and in particular, when it comes to the genus Theobroma, the majority of flavonoids observed in the species were catechin and epicatechin (Figure 6)
Summary
Brazil is currently one of the world’s three largest fruit producers, associated with China and India. There are several studies related to agro-industrial byproducts from fruits of the amazon region with the objective of finding a sustainable destination, among which are worth mentioning those related to the cocoa (Theobroma cacao) [13], cupuassu (Theobroma grandiflorum) [10], pracaxi (Pentaclethra macroloba) [14], and tucumã (Astrocaryum vulgare Mart) [15] by-products. These species are native to tropical forests, originating from the Brazilian Amazon. Further studies are needed to better understand the nutritional, functional, and economic potential of fruit by-products, especially those found in the Brazilian Amazon
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