A potential new source: Nutritional and antioxidant properties of edible oils from cucurbit seeds and their impact on human health

Abstract

Seeds from the cucurbitaceae plant family are discarded as the byproducts which generally obtained after extraction of oil during food processing. Recently, found a great deal of interest as cucurbit seeds are found to be rich source of nutrients such as monounsaturated fatty acids, polyunsaturated fatty acids, tocopherols (α‐Tocopherol, β‐Tocopherol, δ‐Tocopherol, γ‐Tocopherol), carotenoids, β‐carotene, phytosterol, proteins, minerals, vitamins, phenolic compounds, and antioxidants. Despite the potential nutritional benefits, the commercial product of cucurbit plants are lacking in the market. Therefore, there is an urgent need to increase production and utilization of cucurbit seed oil for human nutrition. The main purpose of the present review is to sum up the published information on the nutritional potential of cucurbit seed oils to promote industrial production and stimulates further research on commercial use of cucurbit seeds. Practical applications The aims of this review are to highlight the nutritional values and antioxidant properties of cucurbit seed and their impact on the overall human health. These cucurbit seeds are rich source of vitamins and minerals which are necessary for healthy human diet. In addition to other commercial oils, cucurbits oils are equally important and rich in essential active ingredients. Quite abundance of cucurbit seeds in African continents can pave way to enhance production on the industrial scale which can create employability ranging from farmers to skilled workers. In all, the oil produced from the cucurbit seeds can be applied practically to implement large‐scale production as a part of food industry and dietary supplement industry in paramedical sector.

Gurum Seeds: A Potential Source of Edible Oil

“…These by‐products have great possibilities to be included in the human diet because they contain substantial amounts of vitamins, minerals, fiber, fat, and bioactive components. [ 3,4–6 ] The utilization of wastes needs to design and develop innovative value‐added products for sustainability, decreased management costs, and reduce environmental effects. The development of food products from wastes is a challenge for the food industries because these food products must be unique and cheap and should fulfill the consumer's nutritional demand.…”

“…Additionally, different beneficial products need to drive by these renewable resources. [ 5 ] In fact, due to the increasing trend of substituting animal oil, food industries nowadays are returning to make use of plant material to produce oil. [ 8,3 ] Therefore, fruit seeds could be used for the extraction of oil that contains several bioactive compounds and natural antioxidants.…”

Supercritical CO2 extraction of gurum (Citrulluslanatus var. Colocynthoide) seed oil and its properties comparison with conventional methods

“…Oil is a main source for the tocopherols and it has many beneficial effects on overall human health (Azhari, Xu, Jiang, & Xia, ; Karrar, ; Tripoli et al, ). The tocopherols in the seed oils are extremely important.…”

“…Phytosterols are considered as very important due their antioxidant properties and their effects on human health possessing anti‐cancer and anti‐inflammatory properties (Azhari et al, ; Karrar et al, ; Patel & Rauf, ). The amounts of phytosterolof oil from gurum seed extracted by SFE, SP, and hexane are given in Table .…”

“…Normally, gurum fruit seeds are thrown as waste without further use. Locally in Sudan, those seeds are being used as a formulation in conventional medicines and sometimes eaten as snacks (Karrar et al, ).These seeds are a rich source of unsaturated fatty acids (UFAs). Few reports are available on the gurum seeds oil composition from different localities (Mariod et al, ; Ziyada & Elhussien, ) showing higher omega‐6 or linoleic acid contents.…”