Fractionation of Eremurus spectabilis fructans by ethanol: Box–Behnken design and principal component analysis

• A novel resource for fructan extraction and fractionation was developed.
• Response surface methodology was used for optimization of the fractionation conditions.
• Principal component analysis was used to investigate the characteristics of precipitated fructan.

The fructans, inulin and oligofructose, are known to exert many food and pharmaceutical applications and are widely used in functional foods throughout the world for their nutritional and techno-functional properties. In the present study, the Box–Behnken design was used to determine the optimal conditions for fructan precipitation from Eremurus spectabilis root powder (Serish) by adding ethanol that gave the maximum yield. Ethanol-to-syrup (E/S) ratio (2:1–15:1), precipitation temperature (30–60 °C) and syrup concentration (10–40 °B) were considered variables of fructan precipitation. The most compatible model among mean, linear and quadratic expressions was fitted to each response and the regression coefficients were determined using least square method. There was a good agreement between the experimental data and their predicted counterparts. The optimum conditions for fractionating fructan composition of Serish by ethanol were estimated to be E/S ratio of 8.56, temperature of 23.51 °C and initial syrup concentration of 40 °B. Precipitation under these optimized conditions achieved the best yield (85.81%), average chain length (12.92) and purity (80.18%). In addition, principal component analysis (PCA) allowed discriminating among precipitated fructan specialties.