PREBIOTIC POTENTIAL OF PULP AND KERNEL CAKE FROM MACAÚBA (Acromia aculeata) E JERIVÁ (Syagrusromanzoffiana)

Jerivá and macaúba are palm trees widely found in Brazil that have fruits with nutritional relevance, mainly due to the high fiber content. Also, kernel cake, obtained as a byproduct of oil extraction, is nutritionally rich and, like pulps, may have prebiotic potential. Therefore, the objective of this work was to evaluate the prebiotic potential of jerivá and macaúba pulp and kernel cake. For this, the samples were submitted to anaerobic fermentation with probiotics Bifidobacterium lactis, Lactobacillus casei and Lactobacillus acidophilus, and the pathogenic Escherichia coli. MRS medium (probiotics) and TSB (pathogenic) with pH 7.0 without carbon source were used, with 2% of sample: jerivá pulp (PJ), macaúba pulp (PM), jerivá cake (TJ) and macaúba cake (TM). Also, 2% glucose was used as a positive control (GLC) and fructooligosaccharide (FOS) as comparison, in addition to a negative control without carbon source (C-). Viable cell counts, pH, and organic acids were determined. The data analyzed by ANOVA and Tukey test (5% significance). The presence of the samples (PJ, PM, TJ, and TM) in the medium favored the growth of the evaluated strains and also presented a behavior similar to FOS. A significant reduction in pH (approximately 5.1 for samples, including FOS, 4.3 for GLC and 5.5 for C-) for all strains was verified, corroborating the increase (p ≤ 0.05) of health beneficial organic acids, such as lactic, butyric, acetic and propionic acids, except for E. coli, which did not produce the evaluated acids, although it promoted a reduction in pH. These results show that the evaluated samples were efficient to be used as fermentative substrates. Thus, it is possible to conclude that the pulp and cake of the jerivá and macaúba fruits have relevant prebiotic potential.