Insights into the development of grapefruit nutraceutical powder by spray drying: Physical characterization, chemical composition and 3D intestinal permeability

Abstract

[EN] The development of functional and nutraceutical foods comes from a greater awareness of the relationship between food and health by consumers. On the other hand, the idea of purifying and encapsulating bioactive compounds through techniques such as spray drying is well received in the food industry in order to improve bioactivity. The characterization and development of a grapefruit nutraceutical powder by spray drying adding biopolymers as encapsulating factors is of great interest on the basis that citrus are a source of different bioactive compounds. Physical properties such as water content, porosity, color, as well as the composition in total phenolic content (TPC), total flavonoid content (TFC) and antioxidant activity measured both by radical scavenging activity (DPPH) and ferric reducing antioxidant power (FRAP) were evaluated in the grapefruit powder. Besides, the bioavailability of the bioactive compounds was analyzed through a 3D intestinal model that used the combination of Caco-2 and HT29-MTX cell lines. The bioactive compounds theoretically assimilated by the digestive system were identified by LC-ESI-MS. Delphenidin-3-glucoside and hesperitin-7-O-glucoside presented a permeation higher than 50%, followed by hesperidin that was close to 30%. This work allows to establish that the formulation of grapefruit powder has a great potential as nutraceutical food.