Determination of Proximate Composition, Ascorbic Acid and Heavy Metal Content of African Walnut (Tetracarpidium conophorum)

Authors

  • Edem Department of Chemistry, University of Calabar, P.M.B 1115, Calabar, Cross River State, Nigeria
  • Christopher A. Dosunmu Department of Chemistry, University of Calabar, P.M.B 1115, Calabar, Cross River State, Nigeria
  • Miranda I. Department of Chemistry, University of Calabar, P.M.B 1115, Calabar, Cross River State, Nigeria
  • Bassey Francesca I. Department of Chemistry, University of Calabar, P.M.B 1115, Calabar, Cross River State, Nigeria

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.3923/pjn.2009.225.226

Keywords:

African walnut, ascorbic acid, heavy metals, proximate composition

Abstract

The proximate composition, ascorbic acid and heavy metal content of (African walnut) Tetracarpidium conophorum were evaluated using chemical analysis. The result of the proximate composition showed the following; moisture (48.70%), carbohydrate (53.20%), crude protein (35.22%), crude fat (6.21%), crude fiber (3.34%) and ash (2.03%).It also contained 53.50mg/100ml of ascorbic acid. The heavy metal concentrations in the fruit is Fe (0.064ppm), Mn (0.012ppm), Cr (0.001ppm), Ni (0.005ppm) while the concentrations of Hg, Pb and Cd were not detected. The results revealed that the T. conophorum is rich in ascorbic acid and carbohydrate with moderate valves of crude protein while the ash content was shown to be very low. This result shows that T. conophorum nut is not polluted with heavy metals since the concentrations of the heavy metals were all below WHO permissible limits. This nut is therefore shown to be safe for public consumption.

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Published

15.02.2009

Issue

Vol. 8 No. 3 (2009)

Section

Research Article

License

Copyright (c) 2009 Asian Network for Scientific Information

Creative Commons License

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.

How to Cite

Edem, Dosunmu, C. A., I., M., & I., B. F. (2009). Determination of Proximate Composition, Ascorbic Acid and Heavy Metal Content of African Walnut (Tetracarpidium conophorum). Pakistan Journal of Nutrition, 8(3), 225–226. https://doi.org/10.3923/pjn.2009.225.226