We will be dehydrating fruit peels and check if it can be able to absorb the water. This water absorption is believed to be caused by the dehydration of the pectin present in the fruit peels. However, we do not have any tests that can check the presence of pectin in the dehydrated material yet.
The methods of structural characterization of pectins (standards and extracted from several fruits) were titulometric, infrared and HPLC coupled to light scattering detection (ELSD). The determination of the infrared (IR) GM was obtained from the absorbance values of the bands 1750 cm -1 and 1650 cm -1. For determination by HPLC, stationary phases (ODS-2 and Hiplex) and differentiated mobile phases were evaluated to optimize separation and detection. The best conditions were adjusted to the use of the Hiplex stationary phase in 50 mM H2SO4 mobile phase. The de-esterification conditions of pectin commercial standards were adjusted by varying the NaOH strength, from 0.1 to 3.6 M and reaction time (5 min 360 min), exploited in multifactorial assays.
Pectin (polysaccharide) is digested by enzyme Pectinase into simple sugars and galacturonic acid. So, an enzymatic digestion by Pectinase, and testing the resulting solution for simple sugar (with Benedict's solution) would indicate the presence of pectin in the starting dehydrated material.
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