Abstract: Apricot sauce has excellent nutritional value. However, the sale profit of apricot sauce is very low and its market demand is unstable so that the export has to suffer restriction. To solve the problem of production and market, the adsorption properties of alpha hydroxy acids (AHAs) from apricot sauce was investigated in the present study. The results showed that ion exchange resin SQD56 was selected as the optimal resin among seven resins. The adsorption quantity reached as high as up to (135.81 ± 1.33) mg/g of SQD56 under the conditions of 16 g/L, 20 ℃ and 3 BV/h for sample solution concentration, temperature and flow rate, respectively. Meanwhile, the optimal elution conditions were found to be 4%, 40 ℃, 3 BV/h and 6 BV for ammonia concentration, temperature, flow rate and elution volume, respectively, resulting in a recovery of AHAs of (76.52 ± 1.8)%. Most of the obtained AHAs belonged to the L-type class with malic acid, lactic acid and citric acid accounting for 62.12%, 22.05% and 14.21% of the total amount, respectively.

Key words: apricot sauce, ion exchange resin, alpha hydroxy acid