Pre-heating and polyphenol oxidase inhibition impact on extraction of purple sweet potato anthocyanins

• Pre-heating PSP is an effective method to prevent enzymatic reactions which lead to pigment loss.
• Pre-heating PSP significantly increased polyphenolic yields in a temperature-dependent manner.
• The use of solvent modifiers increased polyphenolic extraction.

Purple sweet potatoes (PSP) have been used as a natural food colorant with high acylated anthocyanins concentrations. Commercially extracting pigments from PSP can be challenging due to firm texture and high polyphenol oxidase (PPO) content. These studies evaluated hot water immersions (30, 50, 70, and 90 °C for 10 min) as pre-heating treatments and addition of PPO inhibitors (citric acid, oxalic acid, and sodium borate) to aqueous extraction solutions to aid pigment recovery. Predominant PSP anthocyanins included acylated cyanidin or peonidin derivatives. Non-pigmented cinnamates acted as oxidase substrates and induced co-oxidation reactions with anthocyanins. Pre-heating PSP significantly increased polyphenolic yields in a temperature-dependent manner, consistent with tissue softening and PPO inactivation. The use of solvent modifiers in the extraction solution associated with heat helped minimize enzyme action and increased polyphenolic recovery. Minimizing the impact of PPO with heat was critical to the extraction and recovery of PSP anthocyanins, suitable for food use.