Comparison of emerging technologies to extract high-added value compounds from fruit residues: pressure- and electro-based technologies

Fruit consumption has significantly increased due to their attractive sensory properties and the growing recognition of its nutritional and therapeutic values. Nevertheless, several tons of fruits are processed by the food industry for the production of different products such as juices and jams, leading to the production of a great amount of fruit waste. Until a few decades ago, fruit residues were not considered a cost neither a benefit but resulted in a significant negative impact on the environment, ending up being used as animal feed, brought to landfills or sent to composting sites. The extraction of high-added value compounds from fruit residues is usually done through conventional methods, such as Soxhlet, hydrodistillation, maceration, and enzyme-assisted extraction. Although these methods are easy to perform and cheap to operate, they present several concerns mainly due to thermo-sensible compound degradation and environment pollution. Recently, new extraction technologies have been in development to improve extraction of high-value compounds, such as high pressure, pressurized liquid extraction, instantly controlled pressure drop, pulse electric fields, and high-voltage electrical discharges, as well its combinations between each other’s. These technologies are considered environmentally friendly, allow the use of lower amounts of organic solvents and the reduction in extraction time and energetic consumption, conducting to higher yields and high-quality final extracts.