Ascorbic acid, Phenolic acid, Flavonoid and Carotenoid profiles of selected extracts from Ribes nigrum

Small fruits such as berries have low energy contents, but high content of vitamins, micronutrients, and dietary fibres and constitute a good source of natural antioxidant compounds that are important constituents of the human diet. This study allowed to identify a large number of compounds in an extract of blackcurrant showing high antioxidant activity and to compare their profile in various parts of the plants (leaves, buds and berries). If it was known that berries contained very high levels of natural phenolic compounds, here we showed that leaves and buds could also be considered as a good sources of natural antioxidants. Indeed, they contained high amount of ascorbic acid, phenolic acids, flavonoids and carotenoids. An acetone mixture can extract several classes of phenolic compounds with a good yield of ascorbic acid, flavonols, flavan-3-ols and anthocyanins. For phenolic acids, it extracted fewer compounds than a specific extraction solution