Phenolic Profile and Antioxidant Activity of Pulp and Peel from Peach and Nectarine Fruits

Abstract

Peach (Prunus persica L.) is a fruit of high nutritional and economic value. Carbohydrates, dietary fibers, minerals and organic acids are among the major constituents of peach fruit, which contribute to the nutritional quality of both fresh fruits and juice. Polyphenolic compounds found in peach may play an important role in physiological functions related to human health. Different polyphenolics may have varied biological activities including antioxidant activity. In this study antioxidant characteristics between peel and pulp of different peach cultivars (‘Radmilovčanka’, ‘June Gold’, ‘Blake’, ‘Hale’, ‘Vesna’, ‘Adria’) and one of nectarine (‘Fantasia’) were investigated. The peel and pulp extracts showed a huge amount of total phenolics (TP), total flavonoids (TF), total hydroxycinnamates (TH) and total flavonols (TFL), ranging from 42.7-211.4, 11.1-128.5 mg GAE/100 g fresh weight (f.w.) (TP), 21.9 -94.9, 5.0-58.9 mg CE/100 g f.w. (TF), 28.4-389.2, 8.5-165.8 mg kg-1 f.w. (TH) and 17.3-54 mg kg-1 f.w. (TFL). High contents of phenolic compounds were significantly correlated with high antioxidant capacities. Peach pulp and peel differ significantly in their phenolic profiles: the pulp contains mainly chlorogenic, neochlorogenic and p-coumaric acids, whereas the peel possesses chlorogenic, neochlorogenic and p-coumaric acids together with several flavonol glycosides in huge amounts. Our results indicate that cultivar and extraction solvent play important roles in phenolic compositions and antioxidant properties of peach and nectarine extracts, which was shown using statistical analysis (ANOVA). There are high correlations between extracted phenolic compounds and peach and nectarine cultivars, and used solvent and part of the fruit (peel and pulp).

Keywords

• hlorogenic acid
• extracts
• glycosides
• HPLC