Jesus Pala Paul, Department of Biodiversity Ecology and Evolution, Faculty of Biology, Complutense University of Madrid, 28040-Madrid, Spain
Jesus Pala Paul, Department of Biodiversity Ecology and Evolution, Faculty of Biology, Complutense University of Madrid, 28040-Madrid, Spain
Environmental Waste Management of Avocado Seed (Persea americana Mill.): Essential oil, Polyphenols and Antioxidant Activity
Avocado (Persea americana Mill.) is a crop in strong international demand, with a production that have increase significantly in the last years. However, during the marketing and processing of avocado products, waste consisting mainly of leaves, peels and seeds is generated, which can represent up to 35% of the weight of the fruit. Therefore, a sustainable management of this bio-waste should be encouraged in order to minimize its economic and environmental impact. In this sense, the valorization of avocado bio waste as a source of value-added compounds, such as polyphenols and essential oils, has emerged. This strategy would make it possible to obtain extracts that can be used as bioactive natural ingredients in various industrial sectors, applying the circular economy.
As such, this work proposes the simultaneous extraction of essential oils and polyphenols from avocado seeds, obtained as bio-residues from a Japanese food manufacturing industry, combined with the chromatographic and spectrophotometric characterization of both fractions.
Phenolic extracts from the different biowaste samples were obtained by ultrasound-assisted solid-liquid extraction in a probe, where the optimal conditions were obtained by a screening experimental design and multi-response surface analysis. Such conditions consisted of 0.4 g of sample, 4 mL of 40:60 ethanol-water extraction solution, 10 min, and US agitation at 60% amplitude and no pulses. In addition, the phenolic content of the decoction waters obtained during the hydro distillation of essential oils has been analyzed.
Further, both TPC and TFC were lower in the decoction waters, which could indicate the effectiveness of the developed USE method.
Complementarily, the antioxidant activity of all phenolic extracts was examined by the DPPH free radical inhibition method.
The essential oils from the seeds were extracted by hydro distillation with cohobation. The yield was very low. The sesquiterpenes compounds were more abundant compounds. The proposed approach is simple and efficient for the integrated valorization of avocado waste, promoting the sustainable recovery of bioactive compounds with potential applications in cosmetic or agri-food industries as aroma and antioxidant additives.
Acknowledgements to the Spanish Science Ministry [PID2020-114714RB-100]