Valorisation of rejected unripe plantain fruits of Musa AAB Simmonds: from nutritional characterisation to the conceptual process design for prebiotic production

The increasing consumption of plantain fruits with specific quality standards generates high agricultural waste. This work aimed at valorising the rejected unripe pulp of Dominico-Hartón plantain fruits (Musa AAB Simmonds). The pulp was characterised physico-chemically, thermally and functionally. The data gathered experimentally and collected from different databases was used to design a production process of isomalto-oligosaccharides (IMO) syrup. The plantain flour contains high levels of starch (87 ± 2 %) and amylose (31.2 ± 0.8 %). The flour showed stability at high temperatures (pasting temperature of 79.26 ± 0.02 ºC), allowing its use in high temperature processes. In vitro gastrointestinal digestion of the plantain flour showed that when cooked, the glycemic index of the flour increases from 47.7 ± 2.2 to 84.2 ± 1.8, while its resistant starch content only slightly decreases from 71.7 ± 1 % to 52.6 ± 2 %, suggesting that this type of flour preserves high content of dietary fibre after digestion. The conceptual process design showed that 18.79 g of IMO are theoretically obtained from 53.24 g of plantain flour maltose. Results suggest that the rejected plantain pulp holds high potential as an ingredient for the production of prebiotic compounds such as IMO.

James A. Gómez S. acknowledges the Ministry of Science Technology and Innovation of Colombia (MinCiencias) for the financial support to carry out this work and the Engineering Faculty of the Universidad de Caldas for its administrative and logistic assistance. This work was supported by the MinCiencias through the research project “Design of a Biorefinery for the Use of the Lignocellulosic and Starchy Waste of the Plantain Agribusiness” (Call 757 for Funding of National Doctorates) [grant 1640318]; and the Universidad de Caldas through the research project “Basic Process Development for the Use of Agro-industrial and Urban Waste Under the Concept of Biorefineries” [grant 0240518]. Enrique Pino-Hernández acknowledges the European Social Fund (call NORTE-69-2015-15) for the financial support provided through the fellowship NORTE-08-5369-FSE-000036. The study was also supported by the Portuguese Foundation for Science and Technology (FCT) under the scope of the strategic funding of UIDB/04469/2020 unit, Project ColOsH (POCI-01-0145-FEDER-030071) and Project AgriFood XXI (NORTE-01-0145-FEDER-000041) funded by the European Regional Development Fund under the scope of Norte 2020-Programa Operacional Regional do Norte.

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