Abstract
The development of a rapid, robust and reliable method for extracting plant food materials is important for screening a wide range of plant bioactives for their health benefits. In this study, extractions of bioactive polyphenolic com-pounds from fruits and vegetables were per-formed using a pressurised solvent extraction technique. Variables including solvent, extrac-tion temperature and time, and number of ex-traction cycles, were optimised to develop a rapid and efficient extraction protocol. The re-sulting extracts were then analysed for antioxi-dant capacity, total phenolic content and com-position. The optimal parameters found were 19:1 methanol/water (95% methanol) as solvent and three extraction cycles, of 10 minutes at 40ºC or 2 minutes at 100ºC. High performance liquid chromatography mass spectrometry did not detect any difference in extract composition between low and high temperatures. Extraction at 100°C generally gave a moderately higher yield of polyphenolics for some fruit and vege-table extracts but appeared to reduce the anti-oxidant activity particularly for turnip leaf, el-derberry and sour cherry extracts as measured by oxygen radical absorbance capacity assay. We found that all 40°C extracts were better at protecting cells from H2O2-induced cellular damage than their 100°C counterparts. The 40°C apple puree and elderberry extracts were about 2 fold and 1.7 fold more effective, respectively, than extracts prepared at 100°C. Our results demonstrated that pressurised solvent extrac-tion technique with careful parameter selection can be used as a quick method for screening the health benefits of plant food materials.
Highlights
The consumption of fruits and vegetables is generally accepted to improve health and wellbeing, as well as reducing the risk of atherosclerotic heart disease [1], neuronal degeneration [2], and cancer [3] by inhibiting various stages of tumour initiation and proliferation [4]
Results indicated that different fruit and vegetable extracts prepared at low and high temperatures behaved differently when analysed for their total phenolic contents and antioxidant capacities
The polyphenolic compositions of the Accelerated solvent extraction (ASE) extracts in this study agree well with those reported in literature on the same plant materials
Summary
The consumption of fruits and vegetables is generally accepted to improve health and wellbeing, as well as reducing the risk of atherosclerotic heart disease [1], neuronal degeneration [2], and cancer [3] by inhibiting various stages of tumour initiation and proliferation [4]. These benefits are thought to be associated with the presence of polyphenolic compounds in fruits and vegetables [5,6,7], such as those in apples, berries and green leafy vegetables. The large amount of solvent used increases operating costs and causes additional environmental problems
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