Background: Fresh-cut fruit are convenient ready-to-eat products increasingly demanded by consumers, but highly susceptible to oxidation. To increase the shelf life of these products, this industry is currently facing the challenge of finding sustainable natural preservatives capable of maintaining fresh-cut fruit quality while meeting consumers' expectations regarding health and environmental concerns.
Results: In this work, fresh-cut apple slices were treated with two antioxidant extracts derived from industrial by-products: a phenolic-rich extract produced from sugarcane straw (PE-SCS) and applied at 15 g L-1 , and a mannan-rich extract obtained from brewer's spent yeast (MN-BSY) applied at two concentrations: 1 and 5 g L-1 . PE-SCS, having a brown color, imparted a brownish hue to the fruit and increased the browning rate during storage, and not even the initial robust antioxidant response (high superoxide dismutase, catalase, ascorbate peroxidase and guaiacol peroxidase activities), prevented oxidation. Fruit treated with MN-BSY extract at 5 g L-1 showed lower color loss rate and higher polyphenol oxidase inhibition, while at 1 g L-1 it showed lower firmness loss rate and lower lipid peroxidation after 6 days of storage.
Conclusion: The results showed that PE-SCS triggers a potent antioxidant response in fresh-cut fruit and, despite it imparting a brown color to the fruit at 15 g L-1 , it may have potential for application at lower concentrations. Regarding MN-BSY, it generally decreased oxidative stress, but its effect on quality maintenance was dependent on the concentration and, thus, to confirm its potential as a fruit preservative more concentrations must be tested. © 2023 Society of Chemical Industry.
Keywords: antioxidant system; by-products; fresh-cut apples; phenolic extract; spent yeast; sugarcane straw; yeast mannans.
© 2023 Society of Chemical Industry.