ANTIOXIDANT CAPACITY OF UNRIPE ACEROLA (MALPIGHIA EMARGINATA) EXTRACTS

Lipid oxidation is a huge problem on food with high lipid content, thus new methods and alternative antioxidants are deeply studied to prevent some harmful effects that the synthetic ones have shown on consumers health. Among the natural extracts with antioxidant potential, acerola fruit has shown an important role. The main objective of this work is to evaluate antioxidant effect of microencapsulated and lyophilized extracts of unripe acerola fruits in lipid emulsions. Standard emulsion and “mayo” emulsions were used. The “mayo” emulsions were prepared with water, refined oils (soy and canola) and milk. The standard emulsion was made with soy oil and water. Both emulsions were added of different types of antioxidants, such as the conventional synthetic (TBHQ, BHA and BHT) and the unripe acerola extracts (lyophilized and microencapsulated). The formation of lipid oxidation products was measured by absorptivity of UV light on 232 nm and by hydroperoxides content. Higher oxidation inhibition was observed on emulsion added of encapsulated unripe acerola extracts. On mayo with soybean oil, the results showed non significative changes among the treatments, but the mayo with canola oil assays showed positive and significative effect of unripe acerola extracts. Therefore, the unripe acerola extracts demonstrated high potential against lipid oxidation, mainly microencapsulated ones, arguing a relevant new bioactive component to be applied as an ingredient in the food industry.