Abstract
Mushrooms are a raw material rich in many nutritional compounds, and that is why a number of them are widely known as functional food. They contain fatty acids, carbohydrates, lycopene, sterols, lovastatin, trace elements, and other valuable compounds that show a wide range of properties, such as hepatoprotective, anticancer, antiviral, etc. For more efficient utilisation of mushrooms' biologically active substances, widespread supercritical carbon dioxide extraction (Sc-CO2) was used as an efficient way to isolate the high-value phytoconstituents from this type of raw material. Using Sc-CO2, the extracts of five types of edible mushrooms-Lycoperdon saccatum, Pleurotus ostreatus, Craterellus cornucopioides, Russula Cyanoxantha and Cantharellus cibarius-were obtained. During the Sc-CO2 process, the extraction time was reduced to 4 h compared to the prolonged process time applied in the typical traditional techniques (6-24 h). The extraction pressure (30 MPa) and temperature (40 °C) were constant. Fatty acids and the compounds of steroid structures were determined in the obtained extracts using GC-MS and GC-FID methods of analysis. The dominant compounds identified in the lipid extracts were fatty acids (linoleic, oleic, palmitic and stearic) and sterols (ergosterol, 7,22-ergostadienone and 7,22-ergostadienol). For complete insight into the process and to obtain the value of the extracts, chemometric analysis is provided. Principal component analysis (PCA) and hierarchical cluster analysis (HCA), as well as k-means clustering, showed that Craterellus cornucopioides was distinguished based on the extraction yield results.
Keywords:
chemometric analysis; edible mushrooms; fatty acids; sterols; supercritical carbon dioxide extraction.