Beyond the devastating effects of HLB on tree health and crop size there are the secondary impacts of preharvest fruit drop and the quality degrading flavor profile of HLB symptomatic fruit. Increasing disease severity increases the percentage of symptomatic fruit being used for juice extraction and their detrimental effect on juice quality becomes more pronounced. Preharvest fruit drop has been reported to have increased 10% − 20% due to HLB and results in a total loss of value for the fruit once it comes in contact with the ground. Enabling a technology to utilize these two groups of HLB damaged fruit and recover lost value would be beneficial to the citrus industry during this transition period before resistant trees are available, especially if that technology could also provide increased value for all juice extracted biomass.<br/>We have developed a pilot-scale continuous process to release and recover multiple value added co-products from these symptomatic HLB fruit and preharvest dropped fruit. Using steam-explosion followed by a simple water wash we have been able to recover pectic hydrocolloids (functional polysaccharides), bioactive phenolics and sugars (a feedstock for a variety of synthetic options as well as an energy source in varied fermentation schemes). Citrus oils (having a variety of established commercial applications) are captured by condensation of the recovered steam upon depressurization. In an effort to optimize the functionality of the pectic hydrocolloids we have conducted experiments on process temperature and time at temperature to determine their effects on molecular weight and intrinsic viscosity. Summing these potential co-products could promote these preharvest dropped or flavor degrading fruits as an alternative value-added resource and recover increased value from juice extracted biomass vs. a traditional feed mill operation.

Recovering value-added co-products from culled HLB symptomatic and preharvest dropped citrus fruit

2019 Spring National Meeting

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