Valorization of Tomato Waste as a Source of Carotenoids

Abstract

Fast-accumulating scientific evidence from many studies has revealed that fruits and vegetables are the main source of bioactive compounds; in most cases, wastes and byproducts generated by the food processing industry present similar or a higher content of antioxidant compounds. In recent years, the ever-growing amount of agricultural and food wastes has raised serious concerns from an environmental point of view. Therefore, there is an increasing interest in finding new ways for their processing toward safely upgrading these wastes for recovering high-value-added products with a sustainable approach. Among food waste, the abundance of bioactive compounds in byproducts derived from tomato suggests possibility of utilizing them as a low-cost source of antioxidants as functional ingredients. This contribution gives an overview of latest studies on the extraction methods of carotenoids from tomato waste, along with an evaluation of their antioxidant activity, as well as their industrial applications.

Biological Approaches for Extraction of Bioactive Compounds From Agro-industrial By-products: A Review

“…Several wastes can be used to obtain bioactive compounds, including cereal bran, which is rich in phenolic compounds, flavonoids, glucans, and pigments (Pauline et al, 2020); fruit and vegetable wastes, which are sources of phenolic compounds (Trombino et al, 2021); and complex carbohydrates (Pérez et al, 2002), as well as animal wastes, e.g., fish wastes rich in omega 3 (Bonilla-Méndez and Hoyos-Concha, 2018) and milk processing wastes as sources of peptides (Pires et al, 2021).…”

“…All fractions of tomato can be used, including the skin, which contains about 510-734 mg of lycopene/kg of dry matter (DM), in addition to significant amounts of lutein, β-carotene, and cis-β-carotene (Knoblich et al, 2005;Nour et al, 2018), and the seed, which has a lycopene content of ~130 µg lycopene/kg DM (Knoblich et al, 2005). Solid fractions can also be used for lycopene extraction (Trombino et al, 2021) from the use of solvents, supercritical extraction (Machmudah et al, 2012;Urbonaviciene and Viskelis, 2017;Hatami et al, 2019), pulsed electric field-assisted extraction (Pataro et al, 2020), and ohmic technology (Coelho et al, 2019), among others. In addition to lycopene, tomato by-products contain tocopherols, sterols and terpenes, fatty acids, phenolic compounds, and flavonoids, showing great versatility in obtaining several bioactive compounds (Kalogeropoulos et al, 2012).…”

A Quantitative and Qualitative Study of Food Loss in Glasshouse-Grown Tomatoes

“…Consumer response to the upcycled food trend has been positive, with 53% of Italian millennials willing to buy upcycled food items, and 69% believe that the addition of upcycled ingredients has positive environmental benefits [39]. Notably, tomatoes have been recognized as a low-cost source of antioxidants such as carotenoids, which can be added to functional foods [40][41][42].…”

Optimization of Extraction Conditions of Carotenoids from Dunaliella parva by Response Surface Methodology

“…Carotenoids can be divided into two groups according to their structure, carbohydrate type and oxidized type. Carotenoids have important biological activities in organisms [ 6 , 7 , 8 , 9 ] and can play an important role in enhancing immunity, anti-oxidation and delaying aging, preventing tumor, cardiovascular and cerebrovascular diseases, and fighting cancer [ 10 ]. Carotenoids also reduce the risk of many types of cancer, metabolic syndrome, obesity, cataracts and chronic diseases such as macular degeneration [ 11 ].…”

“…The organic solvent extraction method has the following advantages: the clear experiment principle, mature technology, ease of operation, and a growing public familiarity. Common organic solvents are anhydrous ethanol, ethyl acetate, 95% ethanol, n-hexane, petroleum ether, methanol solution, 2% acetic acid solution, acetone, and so on [ 9 ]. Because carotenoids belong to a class of lipid-soluble pigments, they can be dissolved by fat-soluble solvents.…”