Proteomic potential of East African Highland Bananas (EAHBs) for banana juice extraction: comparison between juice-producing and cooking cultivars

Abstract

This study investigated the proteomic difference between juice-producing and cooking EAHBs to clarify the role of protein in the production of banana juice. A comparative study was carried out to determine protein content, molecular weight distributions, and amino acid profile of the pulps of ten different (five juice-producing and five cooking) banana cultivars. There was low variability in crude protein content of banana cultivars, the level fell within the range of 0.80 g/100 g to 1.02 g/100 g. SDS-PAGE results visualised that the cultivars had similar molecular weights, ranging between 10 kDa and 76 kDa. The HPLC analysis showed that the relative compositions of amino acids differed significantly (p ≤ .05) within and between juice-producing and cooking cultivars. Both banana cultivars had a significantly higher amount of glutamic and aspartic acids, but significantly lower concentrations of tyrosine, methionine. The results suggest that protein content, molecular weight, and amino acid composition of banana cultivars are not the major factors in determining a banana’s ability to release juice.