Pequi, murici and sweet passionfruit are typical fruits from Brazilian Cerrado, which stand out for their sensory attributes such as color, flavor and aroma, in addition to their high nutritional value. Their seeds are by-products from the industrial processing of juices, pulps, jellies, and others, and have great exploitation potential due to their high oil content and the presence of bioactive compounds. The present work aimed to evaluate the chemical composition of pequi almonds, and of murici and sweet passionfruit seeds, and also to quantify the total phenolic compounds, carotenoids, anthocyanins and antioxidant activity by the scavenging activity of •DPPH method. Concerning the chemical composition, pequi almonds presented the highest concentration of lipids (50%), followed by sweet passionfruit (30%) and murici seeds (15%). The almonds from pequi fruit showed the greatest content of protein (33.3%) followed by sweet passionfruit seeds (15%), which presented the highest amount of fiber (41.3%). Murici seeds exhibited the highest content of carbohydrates (46.4%). Pequi almonds had the greatest content of the following minerals, potassium, magnesium, sulfur, manganese, zinc, copper, iron, and sodium, and anthocyanins (14.4 mg CYG/100 g d.b.). Sweet passionfruit seeds presented the greatest amount of calcium, and also had the highest carotenoid content (9 mg/100 g d.b.). Murici seeds showed the highest potential for bioactive compounds, with 404 mg GAE/100 g d.b. and 81% of scavenging activity for the •DPPH. The results demonstrated that the studied seeds have the potential to be sources for new product development, such as oil.

The Brazilian cerrado has native species with great potential for use, like murici (Byrsonima crassifolia), and pequi (Caryocar brasiliense Camb). The seeds of these fruits are rich in oils and bioactive compounds. The extraction by solvent is widely used to extract oils from the seeds, being hexane the most used solvent in this process. The objective of this work was to evaluate the effect of alternative solvents on oil/soluble solids extraction efficiency and raffinate retention index of solvent extraction of pequi and murici seeds and thermodynamics parameters of the process, using organic green solvents (ethanol, isopropanol, and acetone) and hexane. The extraction has been performed in a shaker using three different temperatures (35, 45, and 55 °C) at the seed:solvent mass ratio of 1:5 (wt/wt). In the extraction with pure solvents the most efficient solvent for both seeds was hexane, at 55 °C, once greater yield and lower retention index were obtained for this condition, along with isopropanol, for pequi seeds. The thermodynamic analysis of the extraction process for both seeds demonstrated positive results to ΔH, and ΔS, and negative results to ΔG, showing the endothermic nature of the process and its spontaneity. Practical applications A great amount of seeds is daily being wasted from industries and households of an agricultural country like Brazil. In addition, the oil from murici and pequi seeds has enormous and important potential as an intermediate raw material for food and pharmaceutical industries. So, the present experimental study is composed of the recovery of the soluble solids from these fruits’ seeds through a cost‐effective method using green solvents, which are environmentally safe. For this purpose, pure ethanol, pure acetone, and pure isopropanol were used as solvents for the extraction process, and compared to the regular hexane. Parametric effects were also investigated on the extraction process to collect the data for the economic process design, and to encourage new researches.

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