Total Antioxidants Activity and Proximate Analysis of Selected Fruits and Vegetables in Jashore Region, Bangladesh

Antioxidant plays essential roles in the maintaining of good health. Fruits and vegetables are the primary sources of antioxidants. Antioxidant contents in fruits and vegetables could vary in geographical distribution and also in the same soil for different time intervals. Therefore, the present study aimed to analyze the total antioxidant status and proximate analysis of some selected locally available fruits and vegetables and they were Mangiferaindica, Musa acuminate, Psidium guajava, Carcia papaya, Lagenariasiceraria, Trichosanthesdioica, Momordica charantia, Basella alba, and Amaranthus gangeticus from three villages. In this analysis, total antioxidant status was determined by DPPH free radical scavenging assay, and proximate analysis of moisture, ash, fat (Soxhlet extraction method), and protein (Kjeldahl method with N × 6.25) were determined as the method outlined in AOAC (2005). Among the four fruits sample, Papaya hadthe highest moisture content (88.08%)but was lower in ash, protein, fat, and carbohydrate contents. Among the vegetables, Bottle gourd had the highest moisture content (94.14%).Regarding all samples, Red amaranth showed the highest ash (1.59%) and protein (4.32%) content. However, both Mango and Papaya showed the lowest protein content (0.70%). Fat content was low in Papaya and Bottle gourdwith 0.10% and 0.15% respectively. For the carbohydrates, Banana was the greatest source with 22.62%. Furthermore, among the fruits Guava had the highest total antioxidants activity of 70.90% and among vegetables, Bitter gourd had 45.47% which was the highest compared to other studiedvegetables. Whereas, Indian spinachhad the lowest antioxidants activity and the value was 28.60%. The above results indicate that the selected fruits contents higher levels of antioxidant activity compared to selected vegetables samples.