Extraction of bromelain from pineapple waste and purification by column chromatograhy

Abstract

Bromelain has potential and demand in worldwide applications especially in pharmaceutical industries but commercial bromelain is very expensive due to high cost in extraction and purification method. Pineapple wastes are proportionally increasing with the production of pineapples concurrently. Pineapple waste not used in any production yet and has no appropriate destinations. Waste disposal become growing problem as it usually prone to microbial spoilage and serious environmental problems. Therefore, this study is to extract bromelain in highest purified form from pineapple waste (crown and stem) from different species in different cultivars at reduced cost. Furthermore, it is economically and environmental friendly. Some studies have demonstrated that bromelain has potential in food, cosmetic and pharmaceutical industries. Bromelain activity was determined by casein digestion unit (CDU) and well diffusion method using skim milk and casein plate. Moris shows the extremely high of bromelain activity in crown (11.852 ±0.555) U/ml while Yankee shows the lowest bromelain activity in stem (0.580±0.091) U/ml. Crown has higher bromelain content compared to stem. Bromelain also was tested with different protein substrate such as fibrin to show the fibrinolytic activity. The purification method used is ion exchange chromatography by using carboxymethy-cellulose (CMC), gel filtration, SDSPAGE and HPLC.