A Comparative Study on the Nutritional, Antioxidant, Thermal, Morphological and Diffraction Properties of Selected Cucurbit Seeds

Abstract

Cucurbit seeds are highly nutritious but generally discarded as a waste by various processing sectors. This study aims to investigate the nutritional profile of seeds of ash gourd, pumpkin, watermelon and musk melon. The techniques, such as mineral, vitamin, amino acid and fatty acid profiling, will provide the nutritional status of the selected seed samples, while the antinutritional accounts will assess the safety of the food application. The thermal behavior of the seeds will guide the decision of the food application of the selected seeds. These seeds were found to be rich in protein and fat, minerals, vitamins and amino acids. The antinutritional compounds in the studied seeds were within the safety limits. Ash gourd seeds had the highest antioxidant activity at 85.11%, with the highest values of total phenols at 176.07 mg GAE/100 g and flavonoids at 159.16 mg QE/100 g. The peaks of the functional group at 3008 cm−1, 1651 cm−1, 1528 cm−1 and 1233 cm−1 denote the presence of polyunsaturated fatty acids, and amide I, II and III, respectively. The thermal analysis of the seeds reviled that the seeds were thermally stable and could be used in product development. The surface morphology was attributed to the interaction of fat, protein and carbohydrates. The semicrystalline or amorphous nature of the seeds resulted in an A-type pattern in the XRD analysis. The results obtained here supports the food application of the selected seeds.