Some wild fruits from amazon biodiversity: composition, bioactive compounds, and characteristics

Abstract

Brazil is one of the countries that share a part of the Amazon region that has been called Legal Amazon. Amazon forest offers the most extraordinary biodiversity of flora and fauna on the planet and, on its surface, can cohabit 50% of the total existing living species. According to some botanists, it would contain about 16-20% of the species that exist today. This region has native fruits with antioxidants and antiproliferative activities already reported by some authors. Consumption of these fruits would be an alternative because they are good sources of nutritional constituents, such as minerals, fibre, vitamins, water, and caloric content. However, the number of scientific studies related to their health benefits is still low. Eugenia stipitata, Myrciaria dubia H. B. K. (Mcvough), Endopleura uchi (Huber) Cuatrecasas, Eugenia punicifolia (Kunth) D.C and Garcinia madruno. Among the main compounds reported are the most interesting groups: phenolic compounds, unsaturated fatty acids, carotenoids, phytosterols, and tocopherols, flavonoids, vitamin B, vitamin A, and vitamin C, and carotenoids. The main beneficial effect of the Amazon fruits is the antioxidant effect; other functional properties as medicinal, antimicrobial, antimutagenic, antigenotoxic, antigenotoxic, and antiinflammatory, antinociceptive, antidiabetic, and gastroprotective, are also reported. Therefore, these fruits can be considered a valuable source of functional foods due to their phytochemical compositions and their corresponding antioxidant activities.