ABSTRACT: In recent decades, the food system has been faced with the significant problem of increasing food waste. Indeed, as reported by the Food and Agriculture Organisation of the United Nations (FAO), approximately 1.3 billion tonnes of food are lost or wasted globally each year (FAO, 2011). For this reason, the European Union has implemented multiple strategies to ensure the sustainability of the food/feed sector. Among these, the Agenda 2030, later supported by the Green Deal, plays a major role, whose goal is to ensure a competitive, clean and circular economy (Fetting, 2020; Vastolo et al., 2022). For this reason, scientific research is investigating the use of non-edible biomass produced along the food chain as co-products (any product obtained from different agro-industrial processes) for livestock (Pinotti et al., 2020; Rakita et al., 2021). As shown by Govoni et al. (2023), the introduction of co-products (11-16%) to replace energy-rich food crops (such as cereals) would conserve 15.4-27.8 Mha of land, 3-19.6 km3 of blue water and 74.2-137.8 km3 of green water, representing an important strategy to ensure environmental sustainability. To date, although many co-products have already been tested (grape marcs, beet pulp, hempseed cake), several more are attracting the interest of the scientific community (Serena and Knudsen, 2007; Muhlack et al., 2018; Lanzoni et al., 2023a). Among these are camelina (Camelina Sativa L. Crantz) and cardoon (Cynara cardunculus), due to both the low environmental footprint and the high nutritional profile (Turco et al., 2019; Singh et al., 2023). More specifically, camelina and cardoon seeds are characterised by a good protein (25.9±2.07% and 16.7% on DM, respectively) and a high lipid (38.9±1.26% and 25-30% on DM, respectively) content (Genovese et al., 2015; Turco et al., 2019; Singh et al., 2023). As reported by Singh et al. (2023) and Petropoulos et al. (2018), the high fatty acid profile of camelina and cardoon seeds, rich in polyunsaturated fatty acids (55.6% and 65.43±0.08, respectively) and low in saturated fatty acids (9.04% and 13.23±0. 07%, respectively), prompted the food and feed industry to isolate the lipid fraction for nutritional and nutraceutical purposes, creating in parallel waste products. Among them, camelina cake (CAMC), cardoon cake (CC) and cardoon meal (CM) could be used in animal feed due to their high nutritional profile, as reported by Lolli et al. (2020), Nannucci et al. (2021) and Serrapica et al. (2019). However, the characterisation of the antioxidant profile and the study of bioactive peptides are still at an early stage. Therefore, in light of the above, the aim of this work was to investigate the modulation of total phenolic content (TPC) and antioxidant activity during the in vitro digestion process with 2′-azinobis-(3-ethylbenzothiazoline-6-sulphonic acid) (ABTS), ferric reducing antioxidant power (FRAP) and oxygen radical absorbance capacity (ORAC) assays of CAMC, CC, and CM. In parallel, peptidomics analyses of in vitro digested CAMC, CC, and CM have been carried out.
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