Alimentary and pharmaceutical dietary research is increasingly focusing on nutraceuticals. In fact, from cosmetics to functional foods, from the herbal market to the food preservation industries, a wide spectrum of applications involves the use of antioxidants of natural origin. A sector where a noticeable amount of data have already been generated is linked to the optimization of extractive processes from antioxidant-rich plant sources. Among them, vitamin E plays a pivotal role, both for its efficacy and for its relatively common presence on many natural sources. Tocopherols and tocotrienols (vitamin E isomers) are well-known natural lipophilic antioxidants, and besides their known activity as free radical scavengers they are also deemed to be able to counteract the onset of pathologies related to fat and cholesterol consumption in the diet. During the last decades, a huge number of matrices and extraction methods have been optimized to set up adequate, faster, cheaper and healthier techniques for vitamin E isolation. With the aim of providing an overview of the most common methods available for both analytical and preparative purposes, the most significant and recent bibliography was summarized, devoting particular attention to methods with better prospectives for the health and herbal market, such as supercritical fluid extraction. Original data regarding the development and optimization of a supercritical fluid extraction process on renewable resources from agroindustrial by-products are provided.
Efficiency of extracting Vitamin E from plant sources
SACCHETTI, Gianni;
2007
Abstract
Alimentary and pharmaceutical dietary research is increasingly focusing on nutraceuticals. In fact, from cosmetics to functional foods, from the herbal market to the food preservation industries, a wide spectrum of applications involves the use of antioxidants of natural origin. A sector where a noticeable amount of data have already been generated is linked to the optimization of extractive processes from antioxidant-rich plant sources. Among them, vitamin E plays a pivotal role, both for its efficacy and for its relatively common presence on many natural sources. Tocopherols and tocotrienols (vitamin E isomers) are well-known natural lipophilic antioxidants, and besides their known activity as free radical scavengers they are also deemed to be able to counteract the onset of pathologies related to fat and cholesterol consumption in the diet. During the last decades, a huge number of matrices and extraction methods have been optimized to set up adequate, faster, cheaper and healthier techniques for vitamin E isolation. With the aim of providing an overview of the most common methods available for both analytical and preparative purposes, the most significant and recent bibliography was summarized, devoting particular attention to methods with better prospectives for the health and herbal market, such as supercritical fluid extraction. Original data regarding the development and optimization of a supercritical fluid extraction process on renewable resources from agroindustrial by-products are provided.I documenti in SFERA sono protetti da copyright e tutti i diritti sono riservati, salvo diversa indicazione.
