PROBIOTIC AND ANTIOXIDANT SUPPLEMENT DEVELOPMENT BASED ON PERSIMMON FRUIT (Diospyros kaki cv. Rama Forte)

Consumption of fruit dietary supplements is increasing over the years and has different applications due to the wide variety of bioactive compounds and its biological activities. Health beneficial properties attributed to probiotic and antioxidant supplements may be associated to prevention of numerous disorders such as cardiovascular diseases, atherosclerosis, diabetes, cancer, among other age-associated conditions. In general, for fermented bioproducts production, availability of medium components and cost of the substrate are critical factors in an industrial point of view. Culture medium may account for up to 50% of the overall production costs of bioproducts, thus the substitution of expensive synthetic media by cheaper feedstock would concur to reduce their production costs and raise their competitiveness. Thus, a useful approach that might be adopted to make probiotic supplements production and commercialization economically affordable is the use of low cost feedstock as alternative substrates. In this sense, persimmon fruit is a viable option, due to its high sugar content and antioxidant potential. In addition, persimmon fruit presents a short-season perishable crop and therefore, there are appreciable post-harvest losses during the diverse stages of its handling in Brazil. Thus, the objective of this study was the development of a low-cost persimmon supplement with probiotic and antioxidant properties, and its physicochemical and functional characterization. Persimmon based supplement was prepared by processing the fruit on 1:4 proportion of persimmon:water, autoclaved and filtered. The supernatant was inoculated with an overnight suspension of Saccharomyces boulardii (Floratil®, Merck S.A., Brazil) for 24 h at 30 °C and 120 rpm. After incubation period, the media was centrifuged for obtention of cell free supernatant for physicochemical and antioxidant analysis. Cellular concentration was quantified by spread plate method. Chemical composition, total soluble solids, pH and titratable acidity of the supplement were determined. Antioxidant capacity was measured by FRAP, ABTS and DPPH methods. Persimmon supplement was able to maintain cell viability during incubation time at 1.0x106 CFU/mL. The supplement was found to contain 91.6; 0.23; 0.06; 0.44 g/ 100g of moisture, protein, lipid and total dietary fiber respectively. Total soluble solids and pH was 3.8° Brix and 4.76, respectively. Persimmon antioxidant capacity was increased by fermentation when analyzed by FRAP methodology (p < 0.05), presenting an antioxidant capacity of 246.00 and 785.00 mME iron sulfate before and after fermentation, respectively. For ABTS analysis, statistical difference was not observed among fermented (644.00 mME of Trolox) and not fermented supplement (524.00 mME of Trolox). In addition, for ABTS assays, ED-50 was 3.9 µL when the supplement was fermented and 3.3 µL prior fermentation. For DPPH analysis, the supplement presented 5.8 µL regardless fermentation process. Results demonstrated the potential of a low cost feedstock supplement based on persimmon as a non-dairy vehicle of probiotic and antioxidant compounds. Further work is ongoing to dry this high humidity supplement by different techniques, such as spray- drying.
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CNPq
FAPERJ
UNIRIO
UERJ