Abstract
Background and Objective: A number of studies have been published from a pharmaceutical and medicinal point of view, focusing on phenolic compounds and their biological activities in various date palm fruits from different date growing countries based on aqueous or alcoholic extracts. The present study was performed to identify the volatile constituents of date palm fruits cultivated in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia at the besser, rutab and tamr maturation stages, as well as evaluating the total phenolic content in the volatile extracts and their antioxidant activity. Materials and Methods: Four varieties of date palm fruits (Phoenix dactylifera L.) cultivated in Saudi Arabia Khalas, Sokary, Seqah and Khenazy were analyzed for their aroma volatiles, total phenolic compounds and antioxidant activity at three maturation stage, besser, rutab and tamr. Results: The 71 aroma constituents were identified using the dynamic head space technique during the maturation stages. Alcohols were the major class of compounds present with 2.6-81.31% followed by carbonyls with 1.69-83.97% in Seqah rutab stage where esters accounted 2.66-49.89% of detected species. Total phenolic compounds were highest in the Khenazy rutab stage (9.23 mu g GAE/100 g), which is in agreement with the radical scavenging activity (IC50 1.45 mu g mL(-1)). Conclusion: The data obtained revealed that, the date palm cultivated in Saudi Arabia are rich in phenolic and antioxidant constituents and probably have use as nutraceutical and functional food additives.