Kinetic Extraction of Total Polyphenols from Pitanga (Eugenia UnifloraL.): Effect of Ultrasonic Treatment, Modeling and Antioxidant Potential

The main objective of this work was to investigate the extraction kinetics of total polyphenol content (TPC) from pitanga (Eugenia unifloraL.) through conventional maceration with solvent, evaluating the effect of temperature, plant-to-solvent ratio and ethanol percentage. In parallel, the mathematical modeling of experimental data was performed and a model that represents the kinetics profile of extraction with their respective response surface has been proposed. Ultrasound-assisted technology was used to maximize the conditions that promote higher polyphenol content extracted using the conventional method, verifying posteriorly the antioxidant activity of the extract by DPPH (2,2-diphenyl-1-picrylhydrazyl) radical-scavenging assay. The results indicated that based on the regression coefficient (R-2), it can be observed that the model predicted satisfactorily the extraction process and the use of ultrasound treatment promoted an increase of about 80.34% in TPC extracted compared with conventional method (from 16.79to 30.28mg GAE/g of plant). Extracts enriched with polyphenols showed antioxidant activity up to 48.84% for a concentration of 0.01g/mL. In general, we concluded that use of ultrasound-assisted technology is important to maximize the amount of total polyphenols extracted and accredits pitanga as a natural antioxidant source for use in food preservation and in human health. Practical ApplicationsThis work describes the practical procedures to obtain a new extract from pitanga (Eugenia unifloraL.), which can be used in different segments of food industry, as in bread baking, edible oils and among others. The results presented can guide the improvement of technique and proposes an interesting alternative for partial or full substitution of synthetic ingredients, increasing the quality of food.