Supercritical CO₂ extraction of bioactive lipids from canned sardine waste streams

In this work supercritical carbon dioxide (sc-CO₂) extraction was explored to recover bioactive lipids from canned sardine residues, with special focus on triglycerides. Aiming at enhancing the recovery of the target molecules, different extraction conditions were applied, including operating pressure (300-650 bar), temperature (35-80 °C) and CO₂ flow rate (5-25 g/min). The performance of sc-CO₂ extractions was compared with a conventional Bligh and Dyer extraction, and the resulting samples were characterized in terms of global yield and fatty acid profile. To evaluate their potential application as bioactive ingredients, extracts were screened for cytotoxicity, oxidative damage, and antiproliferative and anti-inflammatory activities in human intestinal cells (Caco-2 and HT-29). Our results showed that sc-CO₂ extraction was able to produce extracts with antiproliferative and anti-inflammatory properties, which can be potentially used as ingredients in different industrial health-related applications, namely dietary/nutritional supplements, or pharmaceutical products.