Extraction and Assessment of pectin form Pumpkin Peels

Abstract

Pectin is defined as complex mixtures of polysaccharides that make up approximately one third of the cell-wall dry substance of most types plants. This study was carried out to extract pectin from fully ripen pumpkin (Cucurbitaspp.) using two different methods; soxhlet acid extraction method and acid extraction method. And to study the influence of using different acids on the yield of pectin; nitric and citric acids were used. Moreover, to examine the effect of time in pectin yield, the extraction process was conducted using different times 30, 60 and 90 min. The chemical compositions of pumpkin peel (moisture, ash, protein, fat, fiber, total sugar and calcium) and the chemical properties of pectin extracted with both nitric and citric acids (methoxyl content, acetyl content, equivalent weight and degree of esterification) were also detected. The results obtained for the soxhlet acid extraction method and acid extraction method were (7.72% Nitric acid and 6.80 % citric acid) and (6.24% nitric acid and 5.36% citric acid) respectively which indicated that the use of soxhlet acid extraction method with nitric acid obtained the highest yield of pectin. Also it was found that, the maximum time for pectin extraction was 60 min. The result for the chemical compositions of pumpkin peel (moisture, ash, protein, fiber, fats, total sugar and calcium) were (20.1, 7.1, 3.2, 10.15, 2.3, 57.15 and 0.308 %) respectively. The study found that the chemical properties of pectin extracted with both nitric and citric acids were; for equivalent weight (1250 and1250 g/mol), methoxyl content (6.20 and 6.29%), acetyl contain (0.43 and 0.43%) and the degree of esterification (66.53 and 66.57%) respectively. The result obtained from this study indicated that pectin extracted from pumpkin peel is with high quantity and quality and is promising for commercial production.