Pea (Pisum sativum L.) is a nutritious pulse crop belonging to the leguminous family, and widely cultivated. In recent time, health and nutritional benefits of the pea and its by-products enriched with biomolecules, which have gained significant attention to the researchers and consumers. Peas are known for its pivotal nutritional value with high-quality proteins, dietary fibres, starch, carbohydrates and micronutrients including vitamins and minerals. It is also enriched with phytochemicals, antioxidants, flavonoids, tannins and other phenolic compounds under nonnutritional category. Dietary fibre extracted from its cotyledon of the cell wall, seed coats and pods proved to accelerate the gastrointestinal activity by developing intestinal microflora. Intermediate amylose maintains blood glucose level by lowering the glycaemic index and reducing starch digestibility of peas. Pea proteins derived peptides have opportunities in nutraceuticals. Furthermore, pea-derived non-α-galactooligosaccharides could mitigate the gas production by colonic bacteria during the fermentation. Anti-acetylcholinesterase (anti-AChE) was also traced in the pea pod with some antioxidant properties. The focus of this review paper is to provide a comprehensive profiling of chemical compositions and bioactives of fresh mature peas (specifically garden or field pea seeds) and by-products of pea processing (pods and peels) that sets a foundation for assessment of their health benefits.
K E Y W O R D Sby-products, human health, nutritional composition, pea proteins, phenolics), a nutritious agricultural commodity belongs to the Leguminosae family, has potential to withstand freezing temperature which is widely cultivated across the globe (Kour et al., 2020;Tulbek et al., 2017). In terms of productivity, India stands as the second largest producer of green peas next to China and ranks ten among the vegetable crops. The annual global production of green pea and dry pea seeds are approximately 14.5 million tons and 22 million tons, respectively (FAOSTAT, 2019;Mondor, 2020;Senapati et al., 2019). Pea seeds are well known for its pivotal nutrients that can be differentiated in mainly soluble and insoluble fibres, proteins (tryptophan and lysine), complex carbohydrates, vitamin B, folate, minerals namely, calcium, potassium, iron but low content of saturated fat, cholesterol and sodium (Figure 1). Fresh green pea seeds contain 17-22g carbohydrates, 20-to 50-g starch, 14-to 26-g dietary fibre, 6.2-to 6.5-g protein, 0.4-g fat, 1.0-g ash per 100 g with 9-to 10-mg calcium, 3-to 5-mg sodium, 97-to 99-mg potassium per