The Bioscientist (May 2022)
PROXIMATE, MINERALS AND PHYTOCHEMICAL EVALUATION OF PERICARP AND SEED OF TERMINALIA CATAPPA FRUIT
Abstract
Terminalia catappa commonly known as Tropical almond is a plant of the lead wood family, Combretaceae. T. catappa is deciduous and grows well in the tropics. Tropical almond fruit can exist in different colors but the yellow and red-pink varieties are most common. This variation however depends on how the mature fruit ripen, with the pink red ones considered very mature and ripe. Phytochemicals evaluation was carried out on the aqueous extract of the pericarp, in pulp form and seed. Standard procedures were followed to test ten different phytochemicals quantitatively in the seed and pericarp. The result showed the presence of flavonoids, anthraquinones, tannins, steroids, saponins, terpenoids and phenol in both the pericarp and seed. The seed, however showed no presence of alkaloids, glycosides and phlobatannins though they were present in the pericarp. The pericarp contain the highest concentration of phytochemical for the both plant parts in the form of phenol (149.33±0.00 GAE/100g), while the highest concentration of phytochemical for the seed is saponin (84.15±0.25mg/100g). The proximate analysis revealed that the seed has higher moisture, crude protein and crude lipid (23.14±1.06, 22.85±1.27 and 22.20±1.19 % respectively), than in the pericarp(14.31±1.29, 6.40±0.60 and 1.28±0.28 respectively),while the ash, carbohydrate and crude content were found to be higher in pericarp (6.40±0.60, 59.98±4.76 and 13.00±0.98 % respectively), than the seed (3.97±0.16, 24.39±3.98 and 3.19±0.27 % respectively). The mineral contents showed that both the seed and pericarp have relatively higher concentration of magnesium, calcium, iron, zinc, potassium and sodium.From this study, it has been established that the pericarp and seed of T. catappacontain phytochemicals, which are active agents that can be employed as basic elements for the synthesis of drugs in pharmaceutical industries and also contain adequate dietary nutrients that can be used as food supplements.
