CONICET | Buscador de Institutos y Recursos Humanos

Food wastes are generated in different forms and compositions, following regional, seasonal, and processing characteristics in each case. Moreover, they generally contain lower concentrations of valuable compounds compared with the initial sources (i.e. fruits or vegetables). In order to perform a recovery, the solubilization of solutes must take place, may involve one or more solvents that provide a physical carrier to transfer them between different phases (i.e. solid, liquid, and vapor). Nowadays encapsulation is being used to improve stability and bioavailability of several bioactive compounds due to the interest in developing more efficient and selective methods for their protection and preservation. The aim of this work was to use the recovery of antioxidant compounds (betacyanin and polyphenols) derived from beetroot industrial wastes (stems and leaves), and their subsequent encapsulation in Ca(II)- alginate beads containing sugars and biopolymers, providing a detailed structural characterization of these systems determined by SAXS from the molecular (arrange of Ca(II)-alginate dimers) to the supramolecular (interconnection of the rods composing the hydrogel microstructure).Extracts with high concentration of bioactives was successfully recovered of high from beet waste.Ca(II)-alginate beads containing this extracts were successfully produced by the dropping method. The presence of natural extracts prompts important structural changes in the alginate network, from the molecular (arrange of alginate polymer dimers) to the supramolecular (interconnection of the rods composing the microstructure of the hydrogel).However, we also show that certain synthesis additives generally used in these systems to improve their properties (cryo-preservation, preservation and/or release of encapsulated bioactive under certain conditions, and so on) can also modulate nano and microstructure modifications when beetroot extracts are present in the formulation.