Anais do 15° SLACAN - Simpósio Latino Americano de Ciência de Alimentos e Nutrição

Eugenia involucrata is a native tree with a large concentration of bioactive compounds in different parts of the plant, which are considered potential antioxidants. This study aimed to determine phenolic compounds (PC) profile in ethanolic extracts of pulp and seed of E. involucrata and its antioxidant capacity against the neutralization of peroxyl and hydroxyl radicals using the ORAC and deoxyribose methods, respectively. The pulp and seed extracts were prepared in absolute ethanol in the ratio 1:3 (m/v), at a temperature of 26°C, and quantified on HPLC. For ORAC method were used concentrations of PC from pulp extract range of 0.02 – 0.05 µg.mL-1 or seed extracts range of 0.07 – 0.41 µg.mL-1. For deoxyribose method was used different concentrations of PC from pulp extract (2.94 – 14.69 µg.mL-1) or seed extracts (2.57 – 15.40 µg.mL-1). In the pulp extract, PC from the class of phenolic acids (294.3 ± 4.0 µg.mL-1), flavonoids (144.7 ± 26.9 µg.mL-1) and anthocyanins (2.4 ± 1.1 µg.mL-1) were found, and in the seed extract only phenolic acids (9,337.4 ± 593.9 µg.mL-1) and flavonoids (2,213.1 ± 39.1 µg.mL-1) were found. The results obtained for evaluating the antioxidant capacity showed higher peroxyl radical scavenging potency for pulp extract when compared to seed extract (IC50: pulp 0.02 ± 0.0 versus seed 0.12 ± 0.0 µg. mL-1, p<0.05). With regard to the ability of pulp and seed extracts to neutralize the hydroxyl radical, we also observed a high inhibitory potency of pulp extract (IC50: pulp 3.9 ± 0.0 versus seed 4.5 ± 0.1 µg. mL-1, p<0.05). Our data show that pulp extract has higher antioxidant capacity than those of E. involucrata seeds to scavenge peroxyl and hydroxyl radicals. These results may be related to the phenolic profile of pulp extracts, which contain anthocyanins that are absent in the seed extracts.