Spectroscopic Investigations of Dry Fermented Leaves of Cassia Obtusifolia (Kawal)

Abstract

The Sicklepod (Cassia obtusifolia) leaves after fermentation and drying are commonly known as Kawal. Fermented leaves of Cassia obtusifolia are used as a substitute of meat by people of eastern of Chad and western of Sudan. In this study kawal was obtained from Forbranga western of Darfour as a powder. The objective of this study was identification the chemical compositions of the Kawal. FTIR spectrum and atomic absorption spectrophotometer methods were used. In FTIR experimental the sample was used as dried powder. While for the atomic absorption and inductively coupled plasma the sample was used after combussioned for extracting the minerals (K, P, Na, Mg, Ca, Zn and Fe). In FTIR method the investigations was showedthat the Fermented cassia obtusifolia (Kawal) is consist of several types of molecular groups: alky halide, alkene, nitro function, aromatic, carbonyl, alcohol, esters, ether, and acid andamides. Minerals were extracted from the samples by the inductively coupled plasma spectroscopy method: About 2.50% was found is presence of calcium and the other minerals as: Mg 0.66%, P 0.393%, Na 0.165% and K about 1.595%. and for extracting the Iron (Fe) and Zinc (Zn) minerals of fermented cassia leaves the absorption atomic spectrophotometer was used and found that Zn was 0.665mg/L and Fe consist of the value 15.6411mg/L