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Carotenoids and chlorophyll derivatives play a key role in Extra Virgin Olive Oils (EVOOs). Many factors, such as cultivar, geographic origin, maturity of olives, climate and storage conditions, influence the pigments’ content. The quantification of pigments is usually done by chromatographic techniques. However, recent works evidenced the potentialities of UV-visible-related methodologies. In this research, a selection of EVOO samples produced from olives harvested at the beginning of November 2014 in Greece, Tunisia, Italy and Spain, was investigated in terms of pigments by means of two methods. The first one is a recent approach based on the mathematical treatment of near UV-vis absorption spectra of olive oils to quantify in a fast, cheap and non-destructive way four main pigments, namely β-carotene, lutein, pheophytin A and pheophytin B. The second one is a more standard HPLC-DAD method. From the comparison between the two methods, we can conclude that the new near UV-vis approach gives reliable results, with good precision and high reproducibility. Pigments quantified by these two methods in EVOOs produced in four countries from different cultivars are analyzed by principal component analysis (PCA). Results indicate that pigments can be correlated to several factors such as ripeness stage, geographic origin and cultivars. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The aim of this work was to analyze the effect of a microbiological consortium, in particular mycorrhizal fungi, on the phytochemical composition and on the antioxidant properties of Sangiovese wines with respect to wines from conventional agriculture, paying particular attention to their oxidative stability following oxygen exposure. We determined by spectrophotometric methods and HPLC-DAD the phytochemical composition and by ORAC assay the antioxidant activity of wines. Besides, in order to evaluate the beneficial effects of both symbiotic and conventional wines, we investigated on human erythrocytes the cellular antioxidant activity (CAA) and the hemolysis inhibition. Our results showed that symbiotic wines had both a better oxidative stability and a significantly higher level of bioactive compounds compared to the conventional ones. Despite the bioactive compounds variation, no difference in antioxidant capacity was found. However, erythrocytes pre-treated with symbiotic wines exhibited higher biological activities than the equivalent conventional one. In conclusion, the use of a microbiological consortium represents an ecologically and economically relevant solution in vineyard cultivation to get high-quality wines, with improved nutritional and nutraceutical value. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]