Alexandre, Agostinho M.R.C.Matias, Ana A.Bronze, Maria RosárioCocero, Maria JoseMato, Rafael2021-05-042021-05-042020-03-012227-9717PURE: 27994624PURE UUID: 70b9473d-ba99-4137-b7cb-99f2a27fe86cScopus: 85081975194http://hdl.handle.net/10362/117035Arbutus unedo L., commonly known as the strawberry-tree fruit, is an endemic species of the Mediterranean flora. Microwave extraction technology has been considered as a fast and "green" method for the production of extracts rich in bioactive compounds, although the energy consumption is high. To overcome this bottleneck, microwave was used as a pretreatment procedure in short time periods. This technique promotes the burst of intracellular vacuoles leading to an increase in the lixiviation of phenolic compounds. Different approaches were tested, namely a solvent-free irradiation (SFI), a solvent-assisted irradiation (SAI) and a pressurized solvent-assisted irradiation (PSAI). After irradiation, a solid-liquid extraction procedure was performed using a mixture of water and ethanol. A kinetic evaluation of the total phenolic content (TPC) was performed using the Folin-Ciocalteu method. For the total anthocyanin content, a UV-spectrophotometric method was used. HPLC-UV and LC-MS were used for TPC and identification of present compounds. Microwave irradiation led to an increase in TPC of extracts after SAI (52%) and PSAI (66%) along with a reduction in time of extraction from 30 min to less than 2 min. The anthocyanin content also increased by 66% for the SAI and PSAI extractions.1031949engArbutus unedoMicrowave pretreatmentPhenolic compoundsProcess intensificationBioengineeringChemical Engineering (miscellaneous)Process Chemistry and TechnologySDG 7 - Affordable and Clean Energyjournal article10.3390/pr8030298https://www.scopus.com/pages/publications/85081975194