CHEMICAL PROFILE OF PEEL, PULP AND SEED OF Eugenia dysenterica USING PAPER SPRAY MASS SPECTROMETRY

“Cagaita” is the fruit of the “cagaiteira” (Eugenia dysenterica), a native fruit tree of the Myrtaceae family, found in the Brazilian “Cerrado”. This fruit is a rich source in nutrients and bioactive compounds and it presents high potential for marketing products, such as jellies, ice cream, and beverages. The objective of this work was to evaluate the chemical profile of chemical compounds in the pulp, peel, and seed of E. dysenterica. The chemical profile of the fixed compounds in the “cagaita” was evaluated, using the paper-spray ionization method coupled with mass spectrometry (PS-MS) in positive and negative ionization modes. In the positive mode, forty different compounds might be proposed as chemical constituents, nine of which are from different chemical classes including flavonoids, sugars, coumarins, fatty acids, and tannins, three of which are exclusive to the peel and two to the seed. In the negative mode, 31 compounds were identified, including organic acids, flavonoids, tannins, sugars, phenylpropanoids, hydroxybenzoic acids, and fatty acids. The PS-MS analysis has once again proven itself to be a simple, fast, and efficient technique in obtaining the fingerprints of the constituents of the “cagaita” enabling easily the identification of several compounds.