Comparison of total phenols, flavonoids and antioxidant potential of local and imported ripe bananas

Abstract

Bananas are globally used trade crops for nutrition and traditional medicine. The following research aims to study different polarity banana extracts from local and imported ripe bananas and determine the amount of phenols and flavonoids contents, and antioxidant potential by applying various spectroscopic methods. The banana extracts were prepared from the powdered banana samples of Pilipino (Cavendish) and Salalah ripe banana (Somali) by the maceration method with methanol. The methanol extracts were suspended separately in water and successively partitioned by using solvents of different polarity, namely n-hexane, chloroform, ethyl acetate, n-butanol, methanol and water in an increasing polarity pattern. The amount of total phenols and flavonoids contents and antioxidant potential were determined by using the Folin-Ciocalteu reagent, aluminum chloride and diphenyl-picrylhydrazyl methods. The maximum amount of total phenols in the Pilipino ripe banana was detected in ethyl acetate extract, and the minimum was in the n-butanol extract, but in the local Salalah ripe banana the maximum amount of phenols content was obtained in methanol extracts, and the minimum was in n-butanol extract.Similarly, the maximum total flavonoids content in the Pilipino banana was obtained in chloroform extract and the minimum in n-hexane extract with a similar order for total flavonoids content in case of the Salalah ripe banana. Both types of ripe banana crude extracts showed significant antioxidant potential, with the maximum potential in chloroform and n-hexane extracts and the minimum in ethyl acetate crude extract. Therefore, the maximum potential extract of the bananas could be used as natural antioxidants.