The bioeconomy represents a model of sustainable and resilient territorial growth that guarantees the recovery of high value-added products from renewable biological resources, such as waste from fishing activities. The project is aimed at using peach waste as the main substrate for the extraction of vitamin D3 for the production or enrichment of nutraceuticals. The two most important forms in which vitamin D can be found are vitamin D2 (ergocalciferol, of vegetable origin) and vitamin D3 (cholecalciferol, derived from cholesterol and synthesized in animal organisms). Fish waste could be ideal raw materials for the formulation of vitamin D nutraceuticals in a sustainable way, considering the importance of vitamin D in the diet and the high deficiency in the human population (40% in Europe). Fish waste includes the tissues of marine organisms not suitable for human consumption (bones, viscera, heads, skin, tails, etc.) and specimens of commercial species below the minimum size established by regulations to ensure the conservation of marine resources (Minimum Conservation Reference Size, MCRS). Techniques such as microwave-assisted extraction (MAE) and ultrasonic extraction (UAE) will be the methods developed to obtain vitamin D from fish waste, while biotechnological treatments with proteolytic enzymes and lipases used to have better vitamin D yields.
